Serving Severely Emotionally Disturbed Deaf Youth - Alabama ...

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Statewide Deaf Children’s Services Page 19Proposed Continuum of Care for Deaf ChildrenThe authors of this article are employed by the Office of Deaf Services(ODS) under the Alabama Department of Mental Health and MentalRetardation. ODS was established in 2002 as a result of the Baileyconsent decree. The primary mandate of ODS is to provide services todeaf and hard of hearing consumers with mental illness who range in agefrom 18-64. ODS is also responsible for educating the public on standardsfor providing culturally affirmative mental health services to this population.While technically an adult program, ODS is often called to consult in casesinvolving deaf children. Thus, the glaring gap in services for deaf childrenis increasingly highlighted with high profile and difficult to serve children.The need for a continuum of services for emotionally disturbed deaf andhard of hearing children and adolescents becomes distressingly moreapparent with each new case that is referred. This need has led to thedevelopment of a program model now under consideration for adoption inAlabama.This program model requires coordination of fragments of services alreadyin existence or being developed. At the present time, a number of stateagencies have been involved in attempting to serve deaf children with
Statewide Deaf Children’s Services Page 20psychiatric challenges. These agencies include the Department of HumanServices, the Division of Vocational Rehabilitation, the State Departmentof Education, and the Division of Youth Services, as well as severaldivisions of the Department of Mental Health and Mental Retardation.That some kind systemic approach to serving deaf children is desperatelyneeded is not disputed by the agencies. In fact, Alabama has set up aspecial task force for children with special needs that works across all theagencies and brings resources from each to the table. Thus the task forceis able to plan programming for the most challenging children. They havenot been able to effectively serve deaf children because a system of caredoes not exist for this population.Implementing a system of care is best done by instituting statewidecoordination by a person who is an expert in the mental health needs ofdeaf children and by developing some specific new programming. ThisDeaf Children’s Mental Health Services Coordinator should be highlytrained in working with deaf children with psychiatric problems.Newprogramming should include a network of specialized therapeutic fosterhomes and a component of intensive residential care for the few childrenwho cannot maintain stability in therapeutic foster homes.Ideally, the state residential school for the deaf would be accessed foreducational components as they are trained to meet deaf or hard of
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Serving Severely Emotionally Disturbed Deaf Youth - Alabama ...

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