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The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, Division of Mental
Hygiene (Division or DMH), under the City Charter and in accordance with State
Mental Hygiene Law, is responsible for administering, planning, contracting,
monitoring, and evaluating early intervention services for children under three
years old who have a developmental delay or disability, and community mental
health, mental retardation, and chemical dependency services within the City of
New York. In addition, DMH plans and collaborates with other City agencies to
provide a variety of uniquely targeted programs, including those for individuals
who are homeless or who have co-occurring disorders.
DMH is committed to ensuring that all mental health services in New York City
meet the highest quality standards for the over 450,000 people in New York City
who suffer from one or more mental health disorders. It is the Division’s
mission to partner with consumers, families, advocates, and providers to ensure
access to high quality services and to improve the lives of New Yorkers with
mental health and chemical dependency disorders and those with mental
retardation and developmental disabilities.
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Services
DMH contracts for mental hygiene services in four areas: chemical dependency,
early intervention, mental health, and mental retardation and developmental
disabilities. Services are provided to infants and toddlers, children and
adolescents, adults, and the elderly.
- Chemical Dependency Services: These include
detoxification services, supportive living services, and prevention and
education. Buprenorphine is a newly approved pharmaceutical for individuals
seeking treatment for opiate addiction. For more information on chemical
dependency services, click
here.
- Early Intervention Services: Early intervention is a
comprehensive inter-agency program that supports infants and children with
developmental delays in their efforts to realize their full potential. It
reduces the likelihood of delays among at-risk children, assists and empowers
families to meet their child's and their own needs, and entitles children,
regardless of race, ethnicity or income, to services through the program. For
more information on early intervention services, click here.
- Mental Health Services: These services include treatment,
rehabilitation, referral services, and housing and vocational services for
adults and children. For more information on mental health services, click here.
- Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities
Services: These services include a range of day and support services
to individuals with developmental disabilities and their families in New York
City. For more information on mental retardation and developmental disability
services, click here.
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Featured Intitiatives
- Buprenorphine: The Buprenorphine Initiative seeks to have
100,000 New Yorkers with opiate addiction move into a new office-based, opiod
heroin-dependence medication treatment in New York City by 2010. For more
information on buprenorphine, click here.
- Depression Initiative: The goal of the Depression
Initiative is to make depression screening and management standard practice in
all primary care settings in New York City, and to increase the rate of New
Yorkers in treatment for depression by 10% by 2008. For more information on
the Depression Initiative, click here.
- Managed Addiction Treatment Services (MATS): MATS is a
program that seeks to assure access to, and enhancement of, needed
cost-effective treatment, rehabilitation and other social services to
voluntarily participating individuals. Each participant can only qualify for
MATS if they are a high-cost Medicaid-eligible recipient of chemical
dependence services, defined as using $30,000 or more in alcohol and other
drug treatment services in the 12 month period prior to MATS enrollment. For
more information on MATS, click
here.
- Quality Impact: The Division of Mental Hygiene’s
implementation of the Quality IMPACT (Improving Mental Hygiene and Communities
Together) initiative has successfully introduced data-driven quality
improvement efforts into the NYC service system. For more information on
Quality IMPACT, click here.
- Take Care New York (TCNY): the Take Care New York (TCNY)
initiative is a health policy that prioritizes actions to help individuals,
health care providers, and New York City as a whole to improve health. The
Office of TCNY Mental Hygiene Initiatives oversees the implementation of the
two (2) mental hygiene components of the DOHMH TCNY Initiative. These are
items #5 “Get Help for Depression” and item # 6 “Live Free of Dependence on
Alcohol and Drugs”. For more information on the TCNY initiative, click here.
- NY/NY III: in November 2005, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg
and Governor George E. Pataki entered into the New York/New York III
Supportive Housing agreement to create 9,000 new units of supportive housing
in New York City over the next ten years. For more information on NY/NY III,
click here.
- NYC Care Monitoring Initiative: The Care Monitoring
Initiative (CMI) monitors mental health services for consumers in New York
City. Developed jointly by the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH)
and NYS Office of Mental Health (OMH), CMI works directly with mental health
providers to improve care by identifying individual consumer's patterns of
service use, especially those indicating gaps in services, suggesting the need
for prompt intervention. click here.
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Advisory Boards
- The Community Services Board (CSB): This board is
authorized under the State Mental Hygiene Law 41.11 and the New York City
Charter 568 as the advisory body to the Department’s Division of Mental
Hygiene.
- The Federation for Mental Health, Mental Retardation and
Alcoholism Services (Federation): The Federation serves an advisory
role the Department’s Division of Mental Hygiene. The Federation works to
affect policy, address system and consumer issues that pertain to the three
mental hygiene disability areas, identify unmet needs as part of the annual
planning process, and participate in special projects or other requests by the
Department.
- The Local Early Intervention Coordinating Council
(LEICC): The LEICC is made up of parents of children who receive or
who have recently received early intervention services, and professionals,
including providers of early intervention and other services to children and
families. The LEICC advises the Department’s Division of Mental Hygiene about
local early intervention issues.
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Publications
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Contact Information
If you have concerns, requests for further information, or would like to file
a complaint, please contact the Division:
- By telephone at 311, New York City’s phone number for
government and non-emergency services.
- Online at http://www.nyc.gov/html/mail/html/maildoh.html
- For mental health or substance abuse treatment referrals call
LIFENET. LIFENET is a toll-free, confidential help line that
provides callers with information and referrals (for those seeking services)
to mental health and substance abuse resources throughout the New York City
area. LIFENET operates 24 hours per day, seven days per week.
- English: 1-800-LIFENET (1-800-543-3638)
- Spanish: 1-877-AYUDESE: (1-800-298-3373)
- Chinese: 1800-ASIAN LIFENET: (1-800-990-8585)
- Other languages 1-800-LIFENET: (1-800-543-3638)
- TTY hard of hearing: (212 982-5384)
- Online: http://mhaofnyc.org/
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