Engaging persons with psychiatric and substance use disorders in a community-based participatory research initiative: The Boston Community Academic Mental Health Partnership

Mental health services research has often failed to capitalize on the benefits of consumer/community involvement in research. This has contributed to service gaps, barriers to service utilization, and delayed translation of research into practice. Community-based Participatory Research (CBPR) can act as an invaluable tool for conducting mental health research that is relevant and meaningful while also improving consumer quality of life and service satisfaction. While CBPR approaches are increasingly being used in the field of public health to address health disparities among marginalized populations, few of these efforts have involved persons with serious mental illness (and even fewer of these have been conducted in the U.S.).

Designed to bring together mental health consumers, academic and other mental health community stakeholders, the Boston Community Academic Mental Health Partnership (B-CAMHP) was established in 2006 to provide a mechanism for persons with mental health and/or addiction recovery needs (MHARN) to fully participate in the design and conduct of mental health research. One of the first of its kind in the United States, the B-CAMHP was funded by the National Institute of Mental Health to further develop the partnership and to conduct a pilot study of consumer perspectives of psychiatric emergency care. This presentation will discuss the successes and challenges of the B-CAMHP, review the preliminary findings of the Partnership's pilot study on psychiatric emergency services, and explore future directions for the use of CBPR in improving services for people with mental health and/or addiction recovery needs.