good afternoon everybody I hope you've had your lunch and you're equipped with a glass of water I don't think you're allowed to bring coffee in anyway but you're ready for the next session which promises to be a really good one um good afternoon I'm Tom Butcher of the xero project I'm a white male balding running to fat in his mid 60s I'm wearing a green zero project essel Foundation Thai and a rather loud green Tweed coat I'm both honored and sad to be chairing this meeting not least because our dear friend yucky Pomona of inclusion Europe has for medical reasons not being able to join us today and we wish him well going forward since I have nothing like yerky's Authority and knowledge I'm going to keep my introduction and words as short as possible and leave talking to my esteemed panel of experts who you can see range down to my left who with their projects are all awardees of the zero project however before we start I have one dire warning I'm usually a mild-mannered sort of chap but and it's a big but I'm absolutely ferocious when it comes to time keeping and I have Lisa there in front of me who will be helping me out each of our panelists has eight minutes to present her or his project and eight minutes it will be no b no more no less and I will cut you off if you are longer you have been warned so do business in our session today entitled supporting persons with psychosocial disabilities in serious distress we will be presenting community-based models that successfully help keep people with psychosocial disabilities out of institutions and away from the vulnerability of homelessness our Solutions today cover a huge geographical area from the U.S in the west to India in the East with Spain Israel and Austria somewhere in the middle you will have noticed that I used the word Solutions I do do so judiciously this is because Solutions in is what binds all these projects together wherever they are they all provide Solutions in one way means or form solutions that help support persons with psychosocial disabilities in severe distress so without further Ado I shall introduce our esteemed panelists in the order in which they will be presenting and then I will hand over to Claudia to start but first Claudia poisenberger of promente an NGO based in Upper Austria who is to my left there and then second we have Christina gibert and faran Blanco Ross of The Institute assistencia sanitaria in Girona region in Spain and then to their left we have Eddie Maria of the Rincon Family Services an NGO based in my home country it doesn't sound like it I know Chicago in the USA fourth we have Kavita now of the bapu trust here from Pune in India and last but not least right down at the end we have Tao rochach of enosh the Israeli Mental Health Association as I said each panelist will have eight minutes to present and following their presentations if we have time then we might be able to have a we panel discussion I've got some questions for them and after we've exhausted those which might be difficult then we might have time for some questions from the floor so without further Ado Claudia as they say take it away please uh can you press your button good afternoon ladies and gentlemen thank you for the invitation we are very pleased to present our special hotel concept to you today my name is Claudia bautzenberger and I'm responsible for sales and marketing at hotel Vision over Hotel business is the first and still the only inclusion hotel in Austria offering active Social Work combined with a high level of service the hotel is situated in Upper Austria between Passau that's on the border to Austria belongs to Germany and then placed near the quite famous so the hotel is situated in a quiet location nearby the Danube in the countryside and all public areas in the hotel are fully accessible I forgot to show you some picture of our hotel so well um the hotel offers 49 rooms five seminar rooms an event Hall a restaurant a small Wellness area and a mini market to provide the Vigilant population with squashes and daily necessities we work sustainably and are awarded with the Austin Eco label and with the EU Eco labor the main target group are seminar guests we belong to the best seminar hotels in Austria who have already received several awards for that and in addition to that we are also very known as a wedding destination the hotel is part of pomenta a non-profit organization based in Upper Austria and ferment the Upper Austria supports people in psychosocially difficult situations persons with psychological disabilities in rural areas often lack on support structures as well as opportunities for training and employment that's why fermented initiated the hotel in order to offer people with psychosocial disabilities meaningful and those Health promoting and inclusive employment opportunities and as I mentioned before it is a small a medium-sized seminar Hotel including also a mini market besides about 40 permanent employees we employ persons with psychological and psychosocial disabilities we train and support them in a multi-professional manner often leading to a full employment and in times of Labor shortage and Beyond we are doing our best to provide well-trained employees so since our start in 2008 we have doubled the number of employees with disabilities from 20 to 54.
and this was possible due to the expansion of our hotel capacities in 2013. so 2008 we started with 15 rooms five conference rooms a restaurant and now we offer 49 rooms with a total of 96 beds is the first and only hotel in Austria that offers this model of employment skills development and support to persons with psychosocial disabilities offers seven work models to person the supply social disabilities including vocational trainings apprenticeships or temporary and permanent jobs the employees work in all areas of the hotel such as service kitchen housekeeping seminar support or in the mini market and during this time they developed a professional and social skills and an interdisciplinary team of social workers better dogs and personal coaches support them all of whom also offer life skill trainings such as personal hygiene and temporary workers and apprentices often to go to be hired as permanent employees the hotel is 75 self-financed by revenues from the hotel and restaurant and the remaining 25 percent is covered by public sector clients such as the state of Upper Austria and the public employment service of Austria for the purchase of service as the training courses within the different employment models are called so with hotel with the hotel fermented aims to further promote the employment of persons with psychosocial disabilities in a decent service industry jobs and to raise awareness of its model well and the project can be replicated in other locations in Austria also a port as long as it is adapted to the local context and provides specialist support yes and this year we celebrate our 15th anniversary and we are looking forward to the next exciting years in our inclusion Hotel where we would be very happy to welcome you at the hotel business in the near future maybe it's possible thank you very much for your attention thank you very much Claudia and absolutely spot on time and congratulations 15 years that's that's really cool anyway over now to Christina please and faran to tell us about your project um thank you thank you thorough project for inviting us we are going to introduce the open space service I am Christina is well psychiatrist a 58th white woman with long hair we are two people talking because this project is said between two institutions like Caroline said this morning world together is the power uh we have started Girona the institutionalization strategy and we have closing new admissions in long-term psychiatric unit in 2004.
You can see the two the two pictures in one you can see the all Psychiatry buildings and in the in the other side you can see the general hospitals and the and the new building this is a map of the public Mental Health Network on the Girona region we have a lot of resources located in the countryside we have seven other Mental Health Center seven side jobs Mental Health Center seven early psychosis intervention team etc etc you can see the map and we are going to talk about the open space it's a service grade in 2017. locating in Sun very close to the General Hospital and the mental health acute and Subacute unit cell and Girona have 150 000 inhabitants this service is open from Monday Monday to Friday eight to eight and weekends only a few hours in the morning one year ago it was open 8 to 3 P.M the workers is a mixture of nurse nurses Nurse assistants social educators social workers and occupational Therapies from the public Mental Health Service and from support Girona this is a public and private Corporation this is the innovation of the service if you want to go far let's go together Fran run the whole building where the service is located three-story building where people in need of support life the services on the ground floor with basic commodities living room bathroom dining room kitchen laundry basic Healthcare they can come just for tickets hours for take food why is this service needed because the public Mental Health Network sometimes is rigid and normative some people live out of the system there is no flexibility in the system and these people have continuous readmissions in the hospital sometimes we say the people come 9 to 12 three times in a week and if if they don't come is the people who left out the system who attends this the service person with a diagnosis of Psychosocial disability usually with sustainables over labor problems person with no relationship or connection with the public mental health or social service person with low evidence to medical treatment a person living in infra housing situation pensions re-rented room squatter or living in the street and now my cholesterol for REM Blanco is going to continue thank you thank you Christina for those who cannot see me I'm a 37 old white male bold and wearing a navy blue jacket and a blue tie for the second time in in my life and yes how does this service work um first of all it is a voluntary service meaning that no one is coerced or forced to go there it's accessed through a referral document addressed to professionals and the person only needs to sign a basic term of service with basic very basic rules for example a non-con rules that are non-contingent on standard service compliance but only very basic rules for example that the person cannot actively consume drugs in the service in the premises cannot disrespect professionals or cannot engage in fights with other service users and how does it work also we also establish a minimum co-payment for the service in order to work on individual responsibility nothing is free in this life you know that and um of course this payment is adjustable to the situation of the every person of each individual and the maximum that a person has to pay is a hundred euros a month which is quite low if if you ask me um and also talking about impact of this service what we've noticed after the the service is running since 2017 is that the number of persons using institutionalized and residential settings has decreased has dropped um by incredible numbers and the number of persons living at their own home has significantly increased that in terms of statistics means that when the person entered the the analytically at the 60s at the beginning um only 66 16 were living at home and after they left the service that is minimum to 8 to 12 months attending the service 72 percent of them are living in their own home in a shared flat or in some type of uh of facility that they consider their own meaning that the homelessness situations residential settings or living in a hostels or similar Arrangements has also decreased and also involuntary placements in the in the acute and Subacute units of the hospitals which is also another Factor some pictures of of service users in the service here we can see while people uh working on basic everyday living skills to just cooking doing laundry also working on on digital skills which is an essential skill in the in our modern Societies in our modern world and also in Social relationships working in playing some some type of game with other service users what we have learned after these six years we have learned that at the beginning and still but to me to a manual degree there was some Community resistance to the service particularly neighbors complaining that we're strange people and attending this service and they were confused about it no this has led to an active dialogue or between different stakeholders between the city council between social services within law enforcement agencies of course and we supported on and with the public mental health network provider no to explain the project and and how does it work the share the the this has improved a lot this community resistance and this dialogue between the different stakeholders and also we have noticed that the the service has contributed to break the gap between the health services and and social services and as Christina said no activating and coordinating resources is easy when it's done together and it works more efficiently and and overall better um and in terms of transferability and I'm that is the last uh the last one we know for a fact and it was announced yesterday that the Catalan Department of Health wants to open this resource across all Catalonia and incorporate it as a resource a greater resource in the mental health net worth of service and that is this is part of the uh closing the admissions in long-term dealings in Catalonia and it's part also of a new law that the government is working on that also encompasses bridging bridging together the health department and the social Department which is the way forward or at least the way that the Catalan government has considered that it's essential to go and that's all and please don't hesitate to engage with us in conversation to explain a little bit how the the service will be happy to have this conversation thank you great Christina Christina faran thank you very much indeed that was absolutely great and I think the really important thing about their project is the Bridging the Gap and providing Services which is essentially outside the system and I think that's probably one of the most important points and now from Chicago Illinois I hand over to Eddie Eddie take it away please well good afternoon Buenas Tardes to all the zero project attendees and for those that are watching us in the world wide world uh my name is edible Rayo I'm the president and CEO of Rincon Family Services I'm a middle-aged Latino Mayo Brown complexion black hair and beer glasses wearing a blue suit in white shirt and a pink tie I'm very honored to be here talking about our organization which is in 1972 was founded and we're celebrating 50 years of Excellence today we're we're uh looking at our living room program which is a peer-to-peer program in Chicago Illinois it is a hundred percent staffed by bilingual Spanish-speaking and English-speaking staff um its impact has been very remarkable because it is serving those individuals that are suffering from severe mental health or addictions in in a space that is holistic and grounded in in respect and dignity to the person it has really looked at to seeing individuals as guests a living room it is our Nuestra Sala and where individuals are able to come in at any time for any reason to be able to have a space to give them this opportunity to process emotions in a way that is a with dignity and respect the space itself it's geared to address all the major disabilities according to the American with Disability Act that looks at the wheelchair accessibility hearing impairments individuals that need sign language those services will be provided the impact has been very dramatic since its onset in 2019 where we serve 254 individuals doing 2020 at the onset of Covenant October 19 the living room was a pillar and Oasis in the city of Chicago where there's a lot of individuals suffering from emotional distress they were able to come in or engage our staff through telephone or virtually then we were able to serve 322 individuals all the way to 2020 where we're already serving 578 individuals the concept is very similar very basic it's really how do we break the stigma of mental health and how do we create access to mental health by empowering training and hiring peer-to-peer recovery support specialists um The Innovation it is breaking the stigma it is really looking at the model that is a part of a hub and spoke approach that we have at the organization where the program is embedded within our mental health our substance use treatment our child welfare our violence prevention and intervention our Education and Training our immigration advocacy and integration and Workforce all these programs are integrated in a seamless process where any individual from the living room are able to be provided these services at any time the space itself is also geared to meet the individuals at any point of their engagement having a shower and a washing machine available at any time a meditation room where you're able to have a small kind-like experience a library where you'll find educational books for empowerment and and self-growth in a gaming room another way of really engage individuals to meeting their their individual needs scalability we've been able to see this project not only scale within the organization in our sister affiliate organization Dwayne Dean people Health in Kankakee Illinois where we have the same program and is making a big impact but as well as within our Illinois welcoming Center where it's a program that provides services to new refugees from Venezuela in afar and where we're able to embed behavioral health professionals within the aspect and now we're creating living rooms in in many homes across Chicago the best practice is very similar very basic it is really training and empowering individuals with lived experience to become peers to be able to empower and educate families across the city of Chicago where we're continuing to expand these Services as we speak when I return back into Chicago we will be expanding these services in different in other programs thank you so much for your time and your attention thank you so much Eddie um I really appreciate that I think what you're doing is absolutely fascinating and now um closer to me is Kavita who is going to tell you about the Babel Trust hold on hello everyone good afternoon thank you so much for having us here today in this panel I'm Kavita Nair from India I'm board member with the bapu trust for research on my dentist course I'm 45 year old woman black hair wearing reading glasses I'm wearing a pink top with a black jacket and a gray scarf so in the bapu trust we have been working for the past 23 years in psychosocial disability inclusive development our goal has been transforming communities for inclusion today I'll be sharing with you about our Sahar program which has very specific strategies to support people in serious distress when we say serious distress we mean persons in crisis persons who are at risk of being institutionalized or people who are already within institutions we understand serious distress as that time in the person's life when they face a high restriction in participation and undergo rights violations our support interventions are designed precisely to address these when someone is in serious distress one we take this we take steps to prevent their institutionalization to stop them from being institutionalized and two when a person is already within an institution we enable Pathways for them to come out of the Institute institutional setting into open Community settings of their choice we have three core strategies to do this the first one is to develop community-based support systems we develop strong and robust support systems around the person we call it the person's Circle of Care family friends neighbors peers and informal networks of support people are a part of The Circle of Care befriending the person supporting the person by being present and being available with them enabling supported decision making doing self-care practices with the person using alternative ways of communicating with the person a specific support interventions offered to the person when they are experiencing serious distress these actions are taken by different actors in the person's Circle of Care forgot this the second strategy is to ensure that the person receives community-based Support Services when they are in serious distress we set up a neighborhood Lookout system and put a safety plan in place so that the person is not violated and forced we develop a support beat in the person's vicinity bystander ethics and Community Justice meetings are done where community members are mobilized to dialogue and negotiate with the family in the community Justice meetings we have participation from the local police government officials Community leaders and volunteers to put moral pressure on the Family to support the person and ensure their choice decision and agency the third strategy is to ensure that the person continues to have access to mainstream Services throughout the period of serious distress for instance having access to housing or safe shelter having access to food and fluids Health Services were required retaining employment when they are in crisis having access to social protection schemes and benefits all of the this is done through setting up community-based Partnerships we have reached in the last between 2017 to 2022 we our Outreach has been 800 000 in five years working in 30 low-income communities about a thousand people when serious distress have received our support we have 460 people were in crisis 54 people were stopped from being institutionalized and 94 people were offered crisis with with mobilization of the community networks using all of the above strategies all the services were provided free of charge we have replicated the model in three states of India in partnership with 10 development organizations reaching to 57 Villages and 12 low-income urban communities I want to share the story of a person we met during the course of our work in low-income communities we know him as Sada when we met Sada he was wandering on the streets of Pune City he was speaking to himself laughing to himself through community-based support systems we set up foster care arrangements for him to have safe housing for as long as he wished neighbors were mobilized to bring him food daily Essentials and clothing a Friendship Circle was set up around him he was part of a peer support group of people in serious distress he used to wander randomly throughout the day so we set up a safety plan and a support beat around him this and many other interventions at the time helped Sada cross over the crisis period through experiences like Sada and many others we have realized that when an enabling environment is built around the person then they have a chance and then inclusion becomes possible the program is largely funded by Grant support in India it costs us 45 000 Euros annually to reach around 200 000 population the main struggle with funding is that our model is non-psychiatric it is community based there are rare funders investing in disability inclusive development Community projects in mental health the program is sustainable because we follow our cost sharing practice along with the partners that we work with next steps in the program is we will be innovating designs for more inclusive Services adding on elements for building resilience trauma informed Services we will be setting up a community Federation doing a lot more government Partnerships and scaling the program through training based implementation Partnerships you can look up our work at www.baputres.com we are also doing a replication pitch in M2 from 2 pm to 4 pm today please join us thank you Kavita thank you so much incredibly impressive and last but not least tell are you down there tell over to you okay so good afternoon everyone I'm so excited to be here my name is I wear a blue with flowers head cover and sometimes I wear glasses I'm the director of supportive Employment Services Association I want to prevent you mouth entrepreneurship program my off is in Hebrew and it means from a bird's eye Horizon inspiration here is Karen she is 26.
And she lives in a small village in Israel she was going through a multitask crisis instructed to graduate as a Vedic after graduation Hamilton has suffered she she is now recovering and found it difficult to get into the labor market and find a job with many intensive shifts and long working hours this has really deteriorated her mental health so she needed to resign so then she got the help of a social worker who told her about the Ministry of Health the basket of Rehabilitation for people with psychosocial disabilities and she was introduced as introduced her to us here at tanosh Karen came to habilitation committee she was really she was both nervous and excited she wasn't really sure what to what to express what does she want how to share her dreams can she have an opportunity to flourish and be proactive in the labor market and she did she applied and she joined our off program it provides support for entrepreneurs who wish to open a business we do that by providing both Financial coaching and personal case manager together Ken met with their coach every week he helped her to build a financial program the case manager helped her with the recovery mental health program that's a way to include her financial goals and the recoverables Karen had a dream and it came to open in karnina a Grooming Center for dogs can open the business she now walks on her own terms and increases her income and most importantly she do things that she likes that give her strengths and joy even when she has a full mental state that's the show and I will show you a short video about my off just a minute what it what about the just a minute [Music] a national program is a unique initiative that aims to change the reality of people with psychosocial disabilities who wish to open and hold a business in the Free Labor Market the program is funded and supervised by the Israeli Ministry of Health work for about five years I was just so exhausted that I wanted to find some sort of other side job just so that I could work a little bit less in hospital and also spend more time with my dog I already had a rehabilitation basket that I'm getting from the government and when I decided to open up a business my social worker contacted my off and then we just got started our unique program model provides mental health recovery support and business coaching that together with peer support and other training provide the needed foundation for business owners with more fun getting a personal coach that helped me reach my business goals I also have a case manager that helped me with the more emotional aspects my off really helped me while working through all the difficulties of opening a business especially with my mental health situation North gave me a place to share my thoughts my fears my experiences through the process in my off I feel like I have more courage to do things and have more confidence in myself even when it comes to it on anything to do with the business to date we have transformed the lives of more than 500 people in demo of network and now we want to bring our impact to the next stage mouth gave me a fair chance to succeed on my own foreign [Music] services we're just can you bring my presentation again okay so it's part of my off Services we develop and open and put entrepreneurship hubs which is an additional layer to of support group sessions to support and train our participants is in the different stages of opening the business so for Karen that meant meaningful exposure to people like her who are interested in being self-employed and need additional support to succeed once a year you can meet with a personal accountant provided by anosh that gives her technical support with the anal text reports and you know what it is so exciting to see how the reports show Karen's Financial growth each year let's look at the process in my off from the business from the business coach's point of view you can see one of the most coaches who is an excellent business coach but didn't have much understanding and knowledge about Metal Health and disability we have helped this person grow in her role so that she can participate meaningfully in our group politicians and have some understanding with the support of a case manager whose professional is a mental health field so what are the benefits of them off program and what is our impact and success ozoma offers an Employment Program the impact of it is not just improving the financial situation but instead to see how the program can improve different life aspects that support independent living in their community Karen and other participants report that they are improving their ability to cooperate challenges to develop new relationships and use the networks they improve personal and marketing skills they meet other peers and learn from each other they improve their mental health status and the flexibility makes the labor market more accessible to everyone to this date 504 people earn them off Network they all dream of opening the business and succeed in opening one but besides the business aspect they all improved their independence self-efficacy and relationships we can see the impact of my off on their personal and wider social levels mouth is part of enosh the Israeli mental health association's metal services enosh is the largest community-based organization in Israel which promote the rights of people with social disabilities and their families for more than 45 years the person-centered approach led us to create a holistic integrative approach to Service delivery which enables to us to provide supporting housing employment social life and Recreation different aspects of Life to Live fully with a meaningful life I invite you all to connect us and see how the model can be relevant to your work because mental health is everyone's story tell thank you very much indeed um we've got a few minutes and I'm going to I got some questions that I'm one particular two particular questions that I'm going to ask um I don't know whether any of you knew that ma'of is the Hebrew word for vision courage and Imagination and I think that's applicable to the projects of everybody to my left I think they're incredibly incredibly impressive and um I was talking with them beforehand and I said I'm not going to hit you with some really nasty questions I'm going to just ask each one of you two very very simple questions and I'm going to do it in order from my left going down which is in one sentence for the first question one sentence for the second question which is first what's the most important thing you've learned on your journey to where you are now and second what's the most important thing you'd like to share with the audience so Kavita over to you so the first one the most important learning is that people are naturally supportive and caring sometimes they don't know how to do this but there are ways to learn and relearn so that has been the most important learning for me the second one is in context of work I think the most important learning there is when the crpd convention on the rights of persons with disabilities meets the sustainable development goals only then true inclusion becomes possible great thank you very much short sharp to the point there Claudia uh well for us it was important that uh it is not only a hotel it's a social project and to speak about the social project that was is very very important for us to make it visible yes and second yeah it's very very important for people with psychosocial disabilities that they have something to do that they have a work that they feel worth just do something it's very very important thank you very much indeed and um both of you couldn't Christina first you um the the I think the lesson that we have learned is I repeat world together is the power I'm sure that for the public network mental health of Girona has learned a lot for about super foundation and we are better with them and for support Foundation they have learned for us and they are better and and we have created a service for these people that always is out of the service and we have probably working together we are very creative and we have make something that the public system never exists and now the the mental health of Catalunya wants to to do in every place you know this is I think the the first lesson just to compliment what Dr Christina said which I completely agree I think that we need to reflect on the motto think Global at local no and it's like uh Kavita said no we need to be aware of the sustainable development goals on the U.N crpd as the macro policies that guide our action on our and on our intervention but we also need to do something locally to implement that and think that this collaboration and these Services is a service that reflects that that approach and that way of thinking thank you very much Eddie well part of the journey in everybody's life and especially as we look at our project and what we've been hearing here it's like resiliency advocacy and education that is the core to everything that we're doing as an organization but also the experiences that we see from our our participants or our guests at our living room or even our staff where there are stories their experiences has impacted and transformed not only individuals a city but a country and where there is where there is there is no Health without mental health so it is that Spirit of resiliency that we could build upon it it will be a better world thank you Eddie tell I'm going to spare you having to answer the question yeah I think I think that what I have learned most of all is that we that we have to work together and learn from each other and I will be happy to share our knowledge from enosh and I think that we we can learn from other places on the world and there to be a better world great of good Lord thank you very much indeed um so that comes to the end of our absolutely wonderful panels wonderful presentations I I just kind of noted down a couple of things um which I'll use to uh conclude just some um characteristics I think of all of these uh all of these projects and I I think they're an interesting mixture first is the the huge importance of physical space but then associated with physical space is the fact that it has to provide a safe environment and around that both physically spiritually and mentally or howsoever there has to be a community and the community provides both the support the safety and I think probably of Prime importance and you can correct me if I'm wrong all of these projects work on the basis of trust and just how incredibly important it is for there to be the trust between the providers and the users and really between everybody else and then something which which came out and I think is probably a a challenge for all of us specifically in this area and um I think it was evidenced in um Tal's presentation is the whole issue of customization that um there is no one solution fits all we're all individuals and in order for us to go forward in the world as individuals we need to provide individual care we need to receive individual care and I think that's where the challenge lies because it can be time consuming it can be expensive it can be challenging you need to train people but unless you have the customization um I think it's quite difficult to go where you want to go anyway I'm going to wrapping up now so that the people after us can actually get on stage and start on time and I would just like say one last thank you to you all panel it's great and thanks very much to all of you for coming along and listening to these absolutely tremendous people so please raise your hands and one fat Brit will sign off now