The COVID-19 pandemic has and will continue to have far-reaching impacts beyond the immediate concern of virus contraction and related deaths. Current research has shown that vulnerable populations not only face a higher risk of COVID-19 contraction, but also repercussions related to economic stature, housing stability, food security, educational equity, and much more.1-4 These repercussions not only have devastating implications for widening existing disparities, but they also increase the risk for negative behavioral health outcomes, including both substance abuse and mental health challenges.5

In response to this inequity, Impact Charitable established the Left Behind Workers Fund (LBWF) to provide direct cash grants of $1,000 to those who have lost employment due to COVID-19 but remain ineligible for state and federal aid. The LBWF designed a model to partner with local nonprofits across the state to disperse payments directly to undocumented Colorado families in need.

In this blog we spotlight the agility of one of our clients, the Women’s Foundation of Colorado, in their response to the unforeseen challenges COVID-19 has presented to their grant recipients and community. By taking a systemic and intersectional approach that looks at race, gender, and class, WFCO centers equity in its strategic grant-making and serves as a model for how philanthropy can advance equity.

Black lives matter.

Police brutality is systemic and unjustifiable.

All people deserve basic human rights and must be treated with dignity and humanity.

To promote cross-collaboration and help break down data silos, OMNI schedules data presentations at each of the quarterly SEOW meeting. One SEOW member presents to the group on the information they collect, including data collection methods, context, overarching trends, benefits and limitations of the data, and use and external access. OMNI then takes information from these presentations to develop a one-page data spotlight which outlines:

As the Director of Learning and Development at OMNI, part of my work includes helping our staff and clients facilitate effective, engaging meetings. Virtual meetings are the new normal and facilitation is just as important to online environments as they are to in-persons meetings. Below are some of our top tips to support a successful remote/virtual facilitation.

As social science researchers, we often need to glean information from the communities we serve, and one of the best tools for this is survey collection and in-person interviews. COVID-19 put an abrupt stop to our in-person survey collection efforts and has required us to adapt quickly to meet project and client needs while keeping our staff and community members safe.

Welcome to the final part of our series in which we share findings from year one of Virginia’s State Opioid Response (SOR) Grant. This week, we continue our series with a look at progress related to Virginia's recovery efforts. We also share reflections on how recovery services agencies and Peer Recovery Specialists have responded to the emerging COVID-19 crisis, and how their work has quickly adapted to avoid disruptions in recovery services.

As our daily lives are rapidly changing, leaders are being stretched to new lengths in their effectiveness, approach, and decision making. To be an effective leader, one must be agile during times of crisis and rely on their emotional intelligence to meet the needs of their followers.

Welcome to part three in a four-part series in which we share findings from year one of Virginia’s State Opioid Response (SOR) Grant. This week, we continue our series with a look at progress related to Virginia's treatment efforts. We also share reflections on how treatment practitioners have responded to the emerging COVID-19 crisis, and how their work has quickly adapted to avoid disruptions in treatment services.

In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, we are facing unprecedented times characterized by social distancing-- business and school closures, panic shopping, and entire cities on lockdown-- the collective of which has virtually upended every facet of our lives. The enormous cognitive load involved in processing what is happening around us is causing a form of shared trauma that our society hasn’t felt for generations.

Welcome to part two in a four-part series in which we share findings from year one of Virginia’s State Opioid Response (SOR) Grant. This week, we continue our series with a look at progress related to Virginia's prevention efforts. We also share reflections on how prevention practitioners have responded to the emerging COVID-19 crisis, and how their work has quickly adapted to continue to deliver high quality prevention services in the midst of a rapidly changing environment.

As recently as three weeks ago, the opioid epidemic was one of the largest public health crises facing America. With the onset of a global pandemic, public health has been thrust into a new spotlight, and attention has shifted to doing everything in our power to ‘flatten the curve’. Yet for many, addressing the behavioral health needs of ourselves, our families, and our communities remains critically important.

In a four-part series in the coming weeks, we will highlight key findings from one of OMNI’s behavioral health projects—an evaluation of the first year of Virginia’s State Opioid Response (SOR) grant.

As Childhood Abuse Prevention month begins, OMNI aims to bring community awareness to the prevalence and impacts of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs). ACEs encompass all types of abuse, neglect, and other potentially traumatic experiences such as violence or instability in the home that occur in childhood (under age 18). Although ACEs are experienced in childhood, they have wide-reaching effects and lasting impacts into adulthood.

In 2016, the City of Boulder launched the Substance Education and Awareness (SEA) Fund to prevent youth substance use by leveraging the city's recreational marijuana tax revenue to fund community agencies (partners) providing direct programming and to disseminate media campaigns.

Epidemiology curves, outbreak maps, and line graphs of the volatile stock market are flashing across the news and my social media feeds at a breakneck pace these days. The constant updates on the COVID-19 pandemic have made me think a lot about the role data and data visualizations are playing in this public health emergency. As an evaluator working in public and behavioral health, I look at data

Measurement-based Care (MBC), also known as routine outcome monitoring, or feedback-informed therapy, has been shown to positively impact client experience and progress in treatment across diagnoses and treatment modalities, as well as benefit individual clinicians and treatment-focused agencies of all sizes

Individuals with serious mental illness, substance use disorders, and medical health issues are overrepresented in jails and prisons (Fazel, Bains, & Doll, 2006; Steadman et al., 2009; Baillargeon et al., 2009), up to four times the rate as in non-incarcerated populations (Prins & Draper, 2009; Torrey et al., 2010; Fazel & Seewald, 2012). Individuals interacting with law enforcement and/or in jail settings while experiencing mental health and/or substance use disorders are at the height of vulnerability (Birmingham, 2003). As a result, the criminal justice setting is tasked with both the protection of society and an opportunity for screening, treating, and connecting individuals to community services upon reentry (National Research Council, 2014).

Both mental health and substance use disorders are diseases that have biological, psychological, social, and spiritual components (Peters, Taylor, Lyketsos, & Chisolm, 2012). Treatments for mental health and substance use disorders encompass a spectrum of programs, therapies, and other strategies, each at varying intensities. A common theme of treatment for these disorders is that they should be delivered with empathy, without confrontation (MHA, 2017), and individuals should be treated with dignity and respect for their personhood (Marcovitz, 2019).

This year, our Quantitative BPT is leading an organization-wide initiative to train our team and deploy R as our primary tool for analysis, reporting, and visualization at OMNI.