Community Mental Health Services for American Indians and Alaska Natives

Course overview

Course Description: This course is based on material published in the Annual Review of Clinical Psychology and is available as an open-access article. This review updates and extends Gone and Trimbles (2012) prior review of American Indian (AI) and Alaska Native (AN) mental health. First, it de- fines AI/AN populations in the USA, explaining the importance of political citizenship in semi-sovereign Tribal Nations as primary for categorizing this population. Second, it presents an updated summary of what is known about AI/AN mental health, with careful notation of recurrent findings concerning community inequities in addiction, trauma, and suicide. Third, this article reviews key literature about AI/AN community mental health services appearing since 2010, including six randomized controlled trials of recognizable mental health treatments. Finally, it reimagines the AI/AN mental health enterprise in response to an alter-Native psy-ence, which recasts prevalent mental health conditions as postcolonial pathologies and harnesses postcolonial meaning-making through Indigenized therapeutic interventions. Ultimately, AI/AN Tribal Nations must determine for themselves how to adopt, adapt, integrate, or refuse specific mental health treatments and services for wider community benefit. This course on mental health services for American Indians and Alaska Natives is designed for social workers, professional counselors, psychologists, nurses, and substance abuse counselors who do clinical work. In addition, this course is appropriate for intermediate and advanced-level practitioners who wish to develop their knowledge of mental health services for American Indians and Alaska Natives. The course material includes a literature review of research. It may also be useful for licensed clinicians who require continuing clinical education courses for license renewal. The course is based on a journal article that includes research. It contains statistical analysis and data that some clinicians enjoy reading, and others do not. A significant benefit of reading research-based articles for continuing education is that they provide practitioners with the latest findings in their field. Authors: Gone Learning Objectives: This course will provide the practitioner with detailed information regarding mental health services for American Indians and Alaska Natives. Specifically, a professional will: Recognize mental health inequities faced by American Indians and Alaska Natives. Identify community mental health services for American Indians and Alaska Natives. Describe indigenous cultural psychology in the context of American Indian and Alaska Native community mental health. Citation: Gone J. P. (2023). Community Mental Health Services for American Indians and Alaska Natives: Reconciling Evidence-Based Practice and Alter-Native Psy-ence. Annual review of clinical psychology, 19, 23-49. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-clinpsy-080921-072950