Search
Close this search box.

Prevention Pilot Programs

Prevention Pilot Programs

All Arkansans, regardless of their age, ability, or where they live, should have access to a comprehensive and coordinated public health care system that provides services at the right time and right place to meet their needs. In addition, all Arkansans should have the choice of where they want to receive care, including both home and community and institutional settings. Our mission is to improve the care continuum that supports health and well-being by providing a robust array of supports that enable independence, community living, and stabilization or recovery for our specialty populations.

One of those key support areas is Prevention. We want to improve family prevention outcomes by focusing on the following goals:

  • Reduce the incidence of health problems and chronic conditions, especially for specialty populations, by promoting healthy behaviors, early detection, and intervention
  • Enhance overall wellbeing by preventing the progression of illnesses/crises and ultimately lower healthcare costs associated with treating conditions

Several prevention pilot programs have been chosen to make substantial impacts on vulnerable Arkansans. One of those pilot programs is Family Centered Treatment.

Family Centered Treatment (FCT)

Family Centered Treatment (FCT) is a well-supported in-home trauma-focused family therapy model designed to find simple, practical and holistic solutions for families faced with disruption or dissolution of their family. A foundational belief influencing the development of FCT is that the recipients of service have tremendous internal strengths and resources. This core value is demonstrated via the use of personalized family goals that are developed from strengths as opposed to deficits. Distinctive to FCT is the fact that it was largely developed by practitioners for inclusion in the behavioral and mental health array of services. Family and clinicians’ feedback, along with research findings, allow for innovation and up-to-date practices that adjust to meet families’ needs in the current world.

The goals of Family Centered Treatment are to:

  • Enable family stability via stabilization of placement within the home or reunification back into the home.
  • Enable the necessary changes in the critical areas of family functioning that are the underlying causes for the risk of family dissolution.
  • Reduce hurtful and harmful behaviors affecting family functioning by experientially practicing new behavioral interactions and learning the underlying function of the behaviors.
  • Develop an emotional and functional balance in the family so the family system can cope effectively with any individual member’s intrinsic or unresolvable challenges.
  • Enable changes in the referred person’s presenting behaviors to include family system involvement so families gain ownership of the changes and are not dependent upon the FCT practitioner.
  • Enable discovery and effective use of the intrinsic strengths necessary for sustaining change and upholding stability.
  • Incorporate generational and systemic influences of trauma on the family and address them from a systemic lens as opposed to an individual focus.

The Arkansas pilot, administered by the Family Centered Treatment Foundation, provides a new team-based suite of services called “intensive in-home for children” to address serious and chronic emotional or behavioral issues for youth who are unable to remain stable in the community without intensive interventions. This evidence-based program intends to serve between 600-1,200 children during the 5-year pilot. These interventions will include a team of trained paraprofessionals partnering with the family to manage behavioral health challenges being experienced by a youth. The family can access the team in crisis situations and work in partnership with families to prevent future crises.

Research shows when a family-centered approach is deployed to addressing issues rather than focusing on the child alone, programs will see better outcomes for those children and their families. This is especially important for children who have experienced trauma. Stable families reduce the likelihood of exacerbated negative behavioral health outcomes, involvement with the justice system, etc. This program fills in gaps in the continuum of care for families, working to prevent situations that may lead to crisis in the home and community, prevent youth from needing to be treated in institutional settings and assist in transitioning youth from institutional settings back into their homes.

You can learn much more about Family Centered Treatment by visiting their website – Family Centered Treatment: Keeping Families Together. You can also see how Family Centered Treatment fits into the larger continuum of care outlined in the Roadmap to a Healthier Arkansas here.

Key Resources