Taylorville Memorial Hospital issued the following announcement on June 19.
Taylorville Memorial Hospital Foundation sponsored another Mental Health First Aid course held on July 24 at TMH. The TMH Foundation proudly covered the fee for nine local participants from the Christian County Mental Health Association who attended the all-day course to learn how to identify and respond to adults showing signs of mental illness and substance abuse.
“It’s a strategic focus for the TMH Foundation to support community health outreach initiatives such as Mental Health First Aid training,” said Foundation executive director Raedena Ryan. “Healthcare is so much more than what happens within the walls of the hospital. We are committed to helping our community and through the generosity of our donors, we are able to support programs such as this.”
Mental Health First Aid teaches signs of addictions and mental illnesses, a five-step action plan to assess a situation and help, the impact of mental health and substance use disorders, and local resources and where to turn for help.
“Mental Health First Aid has been called ‘CPR for the mind’. Most people know how to recognize and appropriately react to medical emergencies, but there is little knowledge in the general public about what to do in a mental health crisis,” said Penny Shehadeh, Nurse Educator at TMH. "This course provides people in our community with the resources they need so they know how to respond."
The next session will begin at 8 a.m. on September 18th in the TMH Classroom on the 4th floor of the hospital. The $16.95 fee is to provide training materials and the TMH Foundation will again sponsor any resident within the TMH service area who would like to attend. You may register online at memorialbehavioralhealth.com/professionals, or by calling Penny Shehadeh at 217-824-1675 or email shehadeh.penny@mhsil.com.
The four hospitals of Memorial Health System and Memorial Behavioral Health collaborate to offer Mental Health First Aid classes for communities in central Illinois.
Original source can be found here.
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