AHP assisted in the successful delivery of the session for the 2023 COSSAP National Forum: Creating Access to Reentry and Recovery Support Services in Transylvania County Detention Center: First-Year Findings.
Presenters:
Albert Kopak, PhD, Research Scientist, University of North Carolina Health Sciences at Mountain Area Health Education Center, Sylva North Carolina
Kristen Gentry, MA, Program Director, Community Awareness Recovery Effort (CARE) Coalition, Brevard, North Carolina
Becky Harris, Reentry Specialist, Transylvania County Sheriff’s Office, Brevard, North Carolina
Transylvania County, North Carolina (total population 34,385) is nestled in a rural mountainous area that is currently facing the challenges experienced by similar small communities that have high rates of substance use disorder among adults who are admitted to the county’s detention center. With the support of Fiscal Year 2021 Comprehensive Opioid, Stimulant, and Substance Abuse Program (COSSAP)—recently renamed the Comprehensive Opioid, Stimulant, and Substance Use Program (COSSUP)—site-based funding, the county’s Community Awareness Recovery Effort (CARE) Coalition has partnered with the Transylvania County Sheriff’s Office to develop an innovative approach to expand access to pre- and post-release substance use recovery services in the detention center. This project has provided trauma-informed behavioral health services and coordinated recovery services to people who are reentering the community from the jail, both of which were previously unavailable. This has been accomplished by adding a full-time behavioral health therapist and a full-time reentry specialist to the detention center staff. People who are detained in the county detention center have been receiving substance use-related services and case management for more than 6 months. Project staff members have also been working closely with the research team to collect and analyze a variety of key performance indicators, including substance-specific service needs, prevalence rates of mental health conditions, reentry support factors, and recidivism. This presentation will provide an overview of the implementation of the program, the development of the data collection procedures, and empirical findings from the first year of the project. The presentation will also highlight the ways in which pre-release behavioral health services can diminish staff-detainee conflict within the detention center, improve the likelihood of substance use recovery, and reduce recidivism in an understudied rural community.
Learning Objectives:
1. Describe the process used to implement an innovative care coordination model in a rural detention center.
2. Assess the primary pre- and post-release substance use-related needs among adults detained in a rural detention center.
3. Apply this information to the replication and assessment of similar programs in comparable rural settings.
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