Place of Employment:Â Â Â Western State Hospital
Role with Internship:Â Â Â Â Â Educational Support
Western State Hospital is proud of its theoretical shift to the Recovery and Resiliency model of care. The powerhouse Recovery Services core team champions the major tenets of the recovery philosophy at WSH, spreading a message of healing, focusing on strengths, and believing in the possibility of personal growth and change.
Recovery Services adamantly supports patient choice, and encourages patient input into treatment, including the selection of treatment schedules on Recovery Mall, and responsibility for maintaining schedules and recovery-related materials. While instilling hope for a more successful future, this also promotes accountability and empowers people to become more self-directed. Schedules remain flexible and truly individualized.
WSH’s Recovery Mall currently offers 80-106 groups per week, with 51 group leaders and an average daily attendance of 60-70 participants and peaks of 80-85 participants. Some groups have a relatively narrow focus (such as Smoking Cessation or What’s On Your Plate) while others are more broad in scope (such as Coping Skills Group, or Dealing with Feelings). This, along with the individualized nature of schedules, accounts for the variability in enrollment across group sessions.
Markeeta Wilkerson, MS, CTRS, Acting Director of Recovery Services, took over leadership in October, 2012. She focuses on vision, program development, and leading the hospital toward new concepts in Recovery. Jamie Norman, Ph.D. (not pictured) serves as Acting Assistant Director, guiding performance improvement, development and enhancement of policy and procedure for existing recovery services, and daily operation of Recovery Services activities. Phyllis Reynolds, Lori Riley, and Ceslye Burse share a variety of essential duties, including orienting new referrals to the Recovery Mall, scheduling groups, coordinating groups and group leaders, tracking daily and monthly attendance, leading psychoeducational groups, and many, many other tasks.
Roger Logan and Sandra Bradley, both Certified Alcohol and Drug Counselors, offer a variety of recovery-related and substance abuse-related groups on the Recovery Mall, and assist with the daily operation of the Mall as well. Administrative support is provided by Karen Forester (not pictured).
In 2012, the program became a recipient of the Philip J. Ardery Award, along with Eastern State Hospital, for exceptional service to the public concerning mental health promotion, mental illness prevention, and improvement in diagnosis and treatment for mentally ill patients.
“Western State Hospital has stepped up to the challenge of improving the quality of care for folks served in their hospital by developing one of the very best Recovery Malls in the nation . . . The Kentucky Department of Behavioral Health and I are very grateful and very proud of the outstanding contributions the Recovery Mall Team has made to the care of people we get to serve. “
Owen Branam, Recovery Services Coordinator
06/25/2013