Our Front Door: NAMI Help Lines

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Our Front DoorNAMI Help Lines

• Kate Farinholt Deneice Valentine
  NAMI Greater Baltimore
• Sita Diehl Gracie Allen
• NAMI Tennessee

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Objectives

• To consider the value of NAMI Help Lines
• To learn techniques and procedures for Help Line
  operation
• To consider how to take Help Lines to the next
  level

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Why Help Lines?

• Often the first contact with NAMI for consumers
  and families
• We are the voice of consumers and families
• We have gained expertise through personal
  experience
• Effective help line interaction will
• Help the caller
• Bring new callers into NAMI,
• Grow the membership and program usage
• Establish links between NAMI and other community
  organizations
• Help establish your affiliate and state org as
  the local or state Voice on Mental Illness
• Help fund operations

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Help Lines

• Assistance to individuals
• Telephone
• Email
• Face to face follow-up
• Many forms
• Kitchen table
• Dedicated NAMI members answering from home
• Mobile Help Line
• Cell phone with consumer/family counselors
• Staffed Help Line
• Coordinator
• Family/consumer counselors
• Paid or volunteer or intern
• Crisis (24/7) or office hours
• Coordinated with other help lines, or not
• Helping in the name of NAMI

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NAMI Help Line Services

• Peer counseling
• Issues related to mental illness and its effects
• Consumer/family perspective not professionals
• Information
• Mental illness
• NAMI website information
• Local/state materials
• NAMI programs and services
• Mental health services array, access, quality
• Community resources health, housing,
  employment, legal
• Referral
• To NAMI programs and affiliates
• To community mental health services
• To other community organizations

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NAMI Help Line Services (cont.)

• Advocacy
• Individual advocacy
• giving them the keywords and empowering them to
  go to the next step themselves
• Helpline following up to advocate with a system
  directly
• Systems Advocacy
• Tracking types and frequency of calls and
  complaints (to follow up to substantiate
  complaints)
• Helping caller to see where their complaint/issue
  fits within advocacy as well as getting them info
  and resources NOW

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NAMI Help LinesNational Overview

• Help Line Survey April/May 2007
• 71 NAMI organizations responded
• 52 local affiliates
• 34 regional help line
• 66 local help line
• 48 state organizations
• 28 have toll free line

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Coordination of State/Local NAMI Help Lines
N19
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NAMI Help Line Types
N33
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2006 Call Volume
N 29
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Help Line Funding
Annual Budgets
Funding Sources
N33
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Help Line Personnel
N 63
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Top Call Topics
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NAMI Metro Baltimore

• History
• 25 yrs ago, home phone
• 15 yrs ago central office PT staff fielding and
  referring calls
• some mail (postcards newsletter)
• 2-3 volunteer f/m,
• outreach with personal phone

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Temporary Fix

• The Bottom Drops Out Welcome to NAMI Metro
  Baltimore
• Snapshot
• Membership list corrupted
• no
• under attendance
• new programs (F2F and support model)
• Disconnected volunteers
• Little consistency
• mailing list?

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Opportunity Organizational Reassessment

• Finding NAMI
• Staying connected

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Multiple Goals
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Connecting People

• Connections to Community Resources
• Connections to NAMI not to individuals
• Ongoing Contacts
• Connections to programs

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Grow the Affiliate

• Program participants
• Volunteers
• Members
• Visibility
• Funding

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Uniformity and Quality

• Lets Not Do it Twice
• Answers
• Resources
• Basic Packet
• Consumer Packet
• CA Packet
• Provider Packet
• Topical Resources
• Helpline Consistency
• Training
• Quality Assurance

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Call Specifics

• ALL calls are possible helpline calls4-500 calls
  a month
• simple calls for info
• in-depth or crisis calls
• and in- between
• Call length 1min to 45 mins

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NAMI Metro Baltimore

• Staffing
• Tiers
• Team
• Keeping people in touch with what we do
• 4-5 Staff (25 of FT staff and varies with hourly
  staff) All FT staff must attend F2F and periodic
  Info Mtgs
• Interns/Americorps
• Volunteers

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Training

• Basics
• Intake Info and Resource Packets
• Philosophy
• Empowerment,
• Peers,
• Pulling People In
• Looking beyond the Callers Requests to What they
  Need and What we Can Give them

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Tiered Training and Duties

• Level 1Orientation
• Level 2 Communication
• Level 3 F2F
• Level 4 most difficult calls. Review at
  periodic mtgs. is there a resource or can we
  write this up into a protocol?

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Quality improvement?

• Random follow-up calls 6-12 mths later (with
  survey instrument)
• Training
• Tiers
• Oversight and listening in on calls

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NAMI Metro Baltimore

• Typical calls wide variety
• (crisis calls to general support)
• most popular initial topics immediate housing,
• imminent discharge,
• basic info re illnesses,
• support groups,
• specific outreach for specific program,
• referral to treatment
• Real topics
• case management
• array of services for which eligible NAMI
  support and ed for that particular audience
• upcoming Info Mtgs or other events free or
  reduced Rx
• what the system or the police etc can and cannot
  do

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Issues

• The more outreach we do, the more calls we get
  (IOOV, CA, Ambassadors, Fairs 911 BCARS
  referrals)
• The more program participants we have, the more
  calls we get (for more info, etc)

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Follow up

• COLLECT THE CONTACT INFO!!!! and the background
  data
• Topical and customized resource packets all with
  NAMI program and time sensitive info
• Mailing list 6 mths
• Info re website and membership
• Email listserv
• Follow up at 6 mths explaining benefits of
  membership including web based resources.
• Follow up AGAIN and AGAIN

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NAMI Metro Baltimore

• Record keeping
• Intake Sheet keep 5 yrs
• Tracking
• Contact info
• referral to and/or interest in support and other
  NAMI programs
• issues,
• demographics,
• Dx,
• relation,
• etc. etc etc...
• USE this info to follow up with them as well as
  the demonstrate needs

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NAMI Metro Baltimore

• Budget/funding sources
• Unrestricted
• some program funding
• Reporting
• Internal
• External

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NAMI Tennessee Resource Line

• Statewide, toll free number
• 5 (growing) email help line requests
• Peer counseling/active listening
• Information
• Referral
• To NAMI TN regional staff (follow-up)
• To local affiliates (support groups and classes)
• To professional services
• During business hours
• 4 rings in resource line area, then rings
  throughout office
• All staff prepared to answer help line calls
• Call volume 250/month average
• Call length
• 5 - 30 minutes

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NAMI Tennessee Resource Line Personnel

• Part time coordinator
• 3 Paid peer counselors, part time
• 4 Paid regional staff
• Local affiliate volunteers (100)
• Consumer/family volunteers in state office
• All other NAMI TN staff

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NAMI Tennessee Resource Line Training

• State office volunteers Monthly or more often
• Orientation to phones
• Active listening
• Suicide/crisis counseling
• Mental health service system
• Frequently used resources (housing, legal
  assistance, etc.)
• Local affiliate volunteers
• Fall leadership training
• Winter consultation sessions
• State convention

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NAMI Tennessee Record Keeping

• Always available via the Internet
• No special software
• Prevents duplication of caller records
• Previous information easily retrieved during call
• Types of consumer interaction
• phone,
• face-to-face,
• email
• Secure multi-tiered system
• User designated by Affiliate President
• User trained by Resource Line Coordinator
• Confidentiality agreement and password protection
• Keeps local affiliate data separated

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NAMI Tennessee On Demand Reports
Call Summary
Diagnosis
Topics
Race/Ethnicity
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Next Steps Help Line Improvement

• Coordination between National, State, Local
• Volunteer/staff recruitment and training
• Supervision and quality assurance
• Record keeping/reporting

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Help Line Limits What is it that we cannot do?

• Give medical or legal advice
• Refer to particular providers
• Use the help line contact data in fundraising
• Other limitations

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How Help Lines Help NAMI

• Bring in new members and program participants
• Make NAMI more visible in the human service
  system
• Source of revenue
• Grant funds
• Donations as callers get connected
• Ethical limits of fundraising from callers

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Open the Door Promoting NAMI Help Lines

• Promotional materials
• Print
• Web-based
• Through ALL your programs, services and outreach
• Networking with other NAMIs
• Networking with other help lines
• Networking with service providers

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Thank You!Questions?

• Kate Farinholt Deneice Valentine
• NAMI Metro Baltimore
• 5210 York Rd Rear
• Baltimore MD 21212
• 410-435-2600
• www.nami.org/sites/namimetrobaltimore

Sita Diehl Gracie Allen NAMI Tennessee 1101
Kermit Drive, Suite 605 Nashville TN, 37217 (800)
467-3589 http//www.namitn.org