Invited Panel: Affirmative Care Across Domains: Advancing Behavioral Health Equity

Across the lifespan, people from historically marginalized and minoritized communities experience barriers to behavioral health care access and inclusion. Care that affirms a person’s identity and lived experience, and their dignity and value within society, can promote optimal outcomes and increase therapeutic engagement. This panel will discuss a range of challenges faced by historically marginalized populations in accessing quality mental health services, as well as service delivery approaches that help mitigate barriers that reduce service access. Panelists speak from diverse backgrounds and bring expertise across a range of domains and populations including the Deaf and Hard of Hearing community, Indigenous/ American Indian peoples, African Americans, the LGBTQ+ community, and those who identify as neurodiverse. We address issues of discrimination, generational trauma, and socialization and also how these factors intersect with mental health and affirmative treatment thereof.

Ashleigh Coser will be presenting on Affirmative Care for Native Populations.
Melissa Anderson and Dr. Alexander Wilkins will be presenting on Affirmative Care for Deaf Populations.

Isha Metzger will be presenting on Affirmative Care for Black Youth and Families.
The negative consequences of interpersonal trauma take a disproportionate toll on Black youth due to the compounding stress of experiencing unique race related stressors both directly and vicariously. To increase their utility in responding to and treating trauma, cognitive and behavioral therapies should integrate and address cultural risk and protective factors that are likely to influence Black families' engagement in mental health treatment. This presentation will present research on barriers and facilitators to service utilization for Black families and describe a Learning Community for clinicians considering culture in mental health treatment for Black youth and families.

Susan White will be presenting on Affirmative Care for Neurodiverse Youth.
John Pachankis will be presenting on Affirmative Care for LGBTQ+ populations.