College - Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology

“The need for mental health professionals
specifically trained to provide services
for the complex mental health needs of
Latinos in the United States has reached
a critical point,” states Laria, “less than
two percent of psychologists are capable
of providing care to these people. The
2001 Surgeon General’s report high-
lighted the alarming disparities that
exist in providing healthcare treatment
to underserved populations. The Latino
Mental Health Program is an excellent
training and intervention model for
addressing these issues.”
Eventually, Laria would like to see an
expansion of the Latino program to other
cultures, as well as a greater emphasis on
issues relevant to mental health treat-
ment of the poor.
“As we saw in the recent Katrina disaster,
there is an urgent need to address the
close relationship between race and
poverty in U.S. society” he says. “We
need models of training that transcend
the prevailing discourse of ‘culture’ and
address the deeper socio-economic issues
that lie at the core of these problems.
We are hoping to promote this outlook
on the multidimensional factors at play
in working with disadvantaged popula-
tions in the Lucero Latino Mental
Health Program.”
Alumnus | Dr. Steve Hayes
Dr. Steve Hayes, class of 1981, and
already a licensed psychologist when he
arrived at MSPP, came with a passion
to meet the many needs of underserved
communities.
In the 1970s, Hayes opened the Lynn
Community Health Center, which
focused on treating the underserved.
It evolved from counseling programs to
include medical services, a collaboration
on the forefront of integrated behavioral
health and primary care medicine.
Today the Center employs a staff of 400
and operates with a 20-million-dollar
annual budget. Hayes continues as
director of Behavioral Health Center
Services, and the Center continues
its emphasis on treating underserved
populations, providing the full range of
medical and behavioral health services,
from pediatrics to geriatrics.
“We never turn away patients who
cannot afford to pay,” says Hayes.
“Out of the 25,000 active patients
we serve, we offer free care to approxi-
mately 9,000 patients.”
In treating the underserved, the center
specializes in the care of Cambodian,
Latino, Russian, and most recently, it is
attempting to build services for Somalians
of the Bantu tribe. These efforts include
providing services from healthcare pro-
fessionals of that culture, who speak the
language and conduct staff training.
Hayes says that MSPP is on target with
its focus on the underserved, as well as
the quality training given by MSPP.
“Our center only accepts MSPP students
for our psychology internships and post-
doc fellowships due to their maturity
level and solid prior training,” he adds.
Hayes readily admits that he loves his
profession and is very thankful to MSPP
for how conscientiously it is fulfilling
| Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology Annual Report 2005 | 5
its mission.
Alumna | Dr. Lisa Gurland
Dr. Lisa Gurland has reached her profes-
sional pinnacle. With great passion, she
explains, “I am already doing more with
my career than I ever imagined.”
Gurland’s passion is especially exempli-
fied in her role as director of Behavioral
Health Planning and Development on
Disaster Preparedness at the Massachu-
setts Department of Public Health, where
she has provided expertise on a variety of
public health concerns since 1988.
In addition to disaster preparedness,
she has worked in the area of communi-
cable diseases, diversity awareness, and
training and consultation for program
development. “On bio-terrorism, there
is much work with local communities,
hospitals and first-line providers, as
well as drills and training to educate
each other,’ she says. ‘Regarding disaster
preparedness, the work is primarily to
develop relationships between providers—
hospitals, local communities and state
and federal agencies through practice
drills and integrated training programs.
We can’t learn from each other if we
don’t know each other.”
According to Gurland, following Hur-
ricane Katrina, more than 200 people
arrived in Massachusetts from New
Orleans. “We are learning how to meet
the behavioral health needs of people
who are traumatized on many levels.
We are also learning how to take care of
each other as providers. It is a necessary
and complicated task.”
Coming to MSPP as a psychiatric nurse,
and graduating in 1985, Gurland feels
MSPP made a tremendous difference in
grounding her in theory and practice.
“I especially found the supervisors’
courses and community mental health
classes of great assistance,” she says.
With her commitment to public
health, Gurland is pleased with the role
MSPP is playing in the community, not
just as an institution, but a team player
with other institutions who are all
making a difference.