- Features an innovative “My Wellness” partnership with the Westchester County Government
- Provides accessible, evidence-based, and culturally-sensitive mental & behavioral health services to low-income families and evaluates clinical and cultural outcomes, including trauma, anxiety, depression, and behavior symptoms, therapeutic alliance, and cultural sensitivity and satisfaction.
Phase III of our work not only provides accessible, evidence-based, and culturally-sensitive mental and behavioral health services to low-income families, but also evaluates clinical and cultural outcomes, including symptomatology (trauma, anxiety, depression, and behavior symptoms), therapeutic alliance, and cultural sensitivity and satisfaction. Through this effort, our team has developed the field’s first Clinician Cultural Sensitivity and Satisfaction Questionnaire (CCSSQ) to evaluate families’ experience of our therapists’ cultural connectedness and humility, and to shed light on – and help mitigate – cultural barriers to equitable care. Our Westchester Wellness Initiative seeks to understand 1) whether the evidence-based treatments that have been designed at top academic institutions, often tested with white college students, are equally effective among underserved populations who have been historically denied healthcare access, and 2) whether we are successful in reducing two main hypothesized barriers to equitable care: cost and issues of stigma, shame, and lack of cultural sensitivity. Our Westchester Wellness Initiative will also feature an innovative “My Wellness” partnership with the Westchester County Youth Bureau and Westchester Children’s Association, and the county’s 62 after-school programs in underserved communities, providing pro bono care to children and families in greatest need.