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Building Bridges: Behavioral and Public Health Collaborating for all North Dakotans TeleECHO

This project is an opportunity to build understanding and collaboration between behavioral health and public health to focus on addiction counseling and sexually transmitted and bloodborne disease prevention services. The goal of this education is to increase behavioral health professionals' and disease investigators' pool of knowledge, therefore increasing opportunities for networking, linking to care, and treatment for patients.

The Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes (ECHO) series will enable public health staff to have a better understanding of the culture of substance use disorder (SUD) and mental illness. Behavioral health professionals and students will have a better understanding of infectious diseases (reportable conditions) and the investigation process.

This teleECHO™ series is focused on providing support to SUD counselors, social workers, public health staff, disease investigators, and other behavioral health providers through education on understanding the basics of substance abuse and high-risk diseases including HIV, hepatitis, etc. Sessions will include case presentations, illness management, collaborative care practices, and resources available in North Dakota.

Virtual Learning Network and Continuing Education

Hear from a team of individuals with expertise in SUDs and infectious disease investigation as they provide education on identifying and caring for patients with SUD and/or communicable disease prevention and management. These sessions carry free continuing education credits for nursing, addiction counseling, and social work.

Objectives

By building relationships for increased collaboration between behavioral and public health, and providing feedback on patient case studies through didactic and case presentations, participants will be able to:

  • Describe levels of services for addiction and sexually transmitted and bloodborne disease services in North Dakota.
  • Understand how infectious diseases and mental illness impact each other.
  • Identify harm reduction methods and resources available in North Dakota.
  • Recognize ethical responsibility and boundaries relating to addiction services and mandatory reportable conditions.
  • Develop understanding of how services can and need to reach minority groups in North Dakota.
  • Implement strategies to prevent suicide and overdose.

Partners

Heartview Foundation
North Dakota Health & Human Services