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Carolyn Jones Lee Thomas Brenda Smith Today there are over 220,000 NAMI members nationwide. NAMI Knoxville is one of over 1200 local affiliates leading grassroots advocacy solely dedicated to improving the quality of the lives of persons with severe mental illnesses including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder (manic-depressive illness), major depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, severe anxiety disorders, and the childhood psychiatric disorders termed serious emotional disturbances (SED). We have found courage and hope in joining together, both families and consumers, to advocate for needed changes in public policy and attitudes. We feel that by working together, we can make a difference in the lives of our loved ones. Fortunately, many professionals and other supporters are committed to fighting alongside us to insure the needed changes occur. We are stronger together than when we advocate separately- even for the same outcomes. NAMI members are dedicated to increasing access to and availability of consumer- and family-centered community-based services that enhance the likelihood of recovery, including safe, affordable housing; psychiatric rehabilitation; peer support services; job opportunities; education; and medical treatment for persons with psychiatric diagnoses. We are a primary source for information and helpful referral on all aspects of the various types of mental illness. We work for the eradication of stigma and prejudice associated with these illnesses. In 2004, the final report was released by the President’s New Freedom Commission on Mental Health. The report stated what NAMI members already knew- that our mental health system was fragmented and broken. In response, NAMI and many other organizations are banding together to advocate for necessary mental health care reforms. See links One way we give advice to the state government locally is by participating on the Region II Mental Health Planning and Policy Council. Region II comprises Knox and 15 surrounding counties, including Anderson, Blount, Campbell, Claiborne, Cocke, Grainger, Hamblen, Jefferson, Loudon, Monroe, Morgan, Roane, Scott, Sevier, and Union. The council meetings are held quarterly, generally in Knoxville. Each NAMI affiliate is encouraged to be represented on the council with consumer and family (of adults and of children with psychiatric disorders) members. The regional councils elect three delegates to represent their interests on the state council. The state council’s executive committee includes the chairs of each regional council and a few at-large members. By federal law, planning councils must have 51% consumer/family/advocate membership. In order to receive their allocation of federal mental health block dollars, each state must submit an annual plan endorsed by their mental health planning council to the Center for Mental Health Services (CMHS), part of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) of the Dept. of Health and Human Services (HHS). The annual plans are required to include an assessment of current mental health needs and a summary of the services available with a plan for improvements using block grant dollars. The Tennessee General Assembly mandated that the Tennessee Dept. of Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities (TDMHDD) get advice from their TDMHDD, Mental Health, and Developmental Disabilities Planning Councils and related bodies when it revised Tennessee Code Annotated Title 33 in 1999. NAMI was at the table making sure our interests were protected.
NAMI has been a longtime supporter of PACT (Program of Assertive Community Treatment)- an intensive psychiatric treatment and wraparound service that is targeted to those TennCare enrollees who have the most severe symptoms. Without PACT, many individuals would be living in mental health institutions such as Lakeshore. In Tennessee there are only two PACT programs- one here and the first program that began in Nashville. In Knoxville, Helen Ross McNabb Center operates their PACT program on Kingston Pike across from the Bearden Shopping Center.
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