Canadian Observatory on Homelessness
The Canadian Observatory on Homelessness is the largest national research institute devoted to homelessness in Canada. The COH is the curator of the Homeless Hub.
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The Canadian Observatory on Homelessness is the largest national research institute devoted to homelessness in Canada. The COH is the curator of the Homeless Hub.
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Publication Date: 2007
The advantages of employing evidence-based practices are now widely acknowledged across the medical, substance abuse, and mental health fields. This paper discusses evidence-based practices and their use in treating persons with co-occurring disorders, discusses how evidence is used to determine if a given practice should be labeled as evidence based, and gives some brief examples. (Authors)
Publication Date: 2006
Only about half the people with co-occurring disorders (COD) receive any services within substance abuse and mental health (SA/MH) settings. Settings outside the SA/MH system, or settings where service missions do not include a primary focus on COD, are the focus of this overview paper. Primary health, public safety and criminal justce, and social service settings, where persons with COD are likely to be seen, are highlighted. These settings s...
Author(s): James Ulager, A. Pearson, O. Tomeschu, C. Hill, Colette Auerswald, K. Ginsburg
Publication Date: 2005
This study aims to give insight into how urban homeless youth choose whether to trust professionals, and to describe the characteristics of a professional they view as deserving of trust. The authors used a convenience sample of 18-21 year olds recruited from an urban shelter serving homeless youth, most whom have had a history of emotional trauma, exploitation, and abuse. Ethnographic interviews were conducted in 2 phases. Of the 49 interviewed...
Author(s): Jennifer Carlson, Eiko Sugano, Susan Millstein, Colette Auerswald
Publication Date: 2006
The study sought to describe service utilization patterns of homeless youth based on their life cycle stage. Ninety-nine percent of participants accessed services. Medical service utilization was highest among youth who were attempting to leave the street. Drug-related service utilization was lowest among youth most entrenched in street life. (Authors)
Author(s): Therese O'Neil-Pirozzi
Publication Date: 2006
This exploratory study examines the influence of context on interaction patterns homeless mothers use with their preschool children during book-reading and game-playing. The study also looks at the impact of mothers' previously determined language functioning on their contextual use of facilitating language utterances. Using a prospective, nonrandomized, comparison group design, mothers read a book and played a game with their preschool children....
Author(s): Margot Kushel, Grant Colfax, Kathleen Ragland, A. Heineman
Publication Date: 2006
Case management (CM) coordinates care for persons with complex health care needs. It is not known whether CM is effective at improving biological outcomes among homeless and marginally housed persons with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection. Our goal was to determine whether CM is associated with reduced acute medical care use and improved biological outcomes in homeless and marginally housed persons with HIV. We conducted a prospective...
Author(s): Sharon Day, Ruth Jackson
Publication Date: 2005
The Extension Connection enhances life skills to support workforce development of low-income families by providing education promoting self-sufficiency. This program helps develop life skills that provide structure within the family and community. Project STRIDE supports workforce development in a high-crime, at-risk area with education. Project STRIDE increases stability within the family, helps families be productive in their community, and hel...
Author(s): Mark. Stephens
Publication Date: 2006
This summary accompanies the good practice guide on homelessness prevention, by providing key findings from an evaluation of homelessness prevention across ten local authorities.
Publication Date: 2006
The 2005 ACS Special Product for the Gulf Coast Area focuses on two distinct areas: the 117 FEMA-designated IPA counties, and the remaining counties in each state not identified as FEMA-designated IPA counties ("balance of the state"). The 2005 ACS Special Product for the Gulf Coast Area contains information for these two distinct areas for January through August of 2005 and for September through December of 2005. (Authors)
Author(s): Benjamin Alexander-Eitzman
Publication Date: 2006
This letter to the editor by social worker Bejamin Alexander-Eitzman suggests that another article appearing in the Journal (Canton, et al. Risk factors for long-term homelessness: findings from a longitudinal study of first-time homeless single adults) examines the wrong questions. Alexander-Eitzman believes that the public healthification of homelessness (e.g., that social problems such as homelessness are defined by personal-level determinants...
Author(s): Richard Christensen, Lorrie Garces
The authors of this editorial believe there is a lack of clinically applicable research on homelessness and suicide. To support their belief, the authors discuss a person under their care who had obtained housing, a job and was free from substance abuse. His past experiences, however, were too painful for him and he committed suicide. The authors conclude with a call for clinically applicable research. (Authors)
Publication Date: 2006
This report contains policy recommendations in the areas of employment, income and asset growth, health, education and healthy family relationships. Providing state leaders with a central set of policy priorities, the report includes a 50-state policy overview.
Author(s): Brent B. Benda
Publication Date: 2006
This study examines gender differences and how well various forms of trauma and social support predict homeless substance abusers' tenure in the community without rehospitalization. Researchers analyzed sexual and physical abuses at different stages of participants' lives, combat exposure, and recent traumatic along with social support factors via Cox's proportional hazard model of survival in a 2-year follow-up. The survival models showed simila...
Publication Date: 2006
This report is the first comprehensive survey and grading of state adult public mental healthcare systems conducted in more than 15 years. Public systems serve people with serious mental illnesses—such as schizophrenia, bipolar illness, and major depression—who have the lowest incomes. The report confirms in state-by-state detail what President Bush’s New Freedom Commission on Mental Health called a fragmented system in shambles. Nationally, the...
Author(s): Linda Jocovy
Publication Date: 2006
In an effort to address the challenges facing former prisoners and the communities to which they return, Public/Private Ventures (P/PV) developed and launched Ready4Work: An Ex-Prisoner, Community and Faith Initiative. Funded by the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) Employment and Training Administration (ETA), the U.S. Department of Justice, the Annie E. Casey Foundation and the Ford Foundation, this three-year pilot program was designed to help r...
Author(s): Ilan Harpaz-Rotem, Robert Rosenheck, Rani Desai
Publication Date: 2006
In recent years a number of reports have documented an increase in the number of homeless families in the US. Using a sample of 195 mothers who were veterans of the US armed forces we assessed the association of maternal homelessness and clinical status, with measures of children’s mental health, school enrolment and attendance. Although maternal homelessness had no significant association with children’s reported emotional problems it had a prof...
Author(s): Marc Rosen, Thomas McMahon, HaiQun Lin
Publication Date: 2006
The findings of a study determine whether social supplemental security income (SSI) or Social Security disability income (SSDI) disability payments is associated with increased drug and alcohol use in a sample of 6,199 homeless and mentally ill participants in the Access to Community Care and Effective Social Supports and Services. The authors report on the observational, 12-month, cohort study that was completed over 4 years. Substance abuse...
Author(s): Audrey Conrad, Sabrina Grolleau, Florence Lamarque, Christophe Beitz, Stephane Brugere, Helene Verdoux
Publication Date: 2006
Homelessness is an increasing problem among subjects with severe mental illnesses and little is known about the characteristics of homeless subjects with psychosis using emergency psychiatric services. The aims of the present study were to assess the frequency of psychotic disorders among subjects attending a psychiatric emergency service and to explore the clinical and demographic characteristics of these subjects and the management proposed by...
Author(s): Kimberley Isett, Joseph Morrissey
Publication Date: 2006
ACCESS demonstration sites were followed for an additional two years beyond the scheduled four-year evaluation to assess whether any delayed effects had occurred in system and project integration. For system integration, findings indicate that there was a sharp increase between Wave 3 (1998) and Wave 4 (2000), but experimental and comparison sites had identical trends. For project integration, experimental sites at Wave 4 sustained the high level...
Author(s): Manfred Fichter, Norbert Quadflieg
Publication Date: 2006
Objective: To describe the intervention effects of supplying homeless individuals with permanent housing. Method: In a prospective study, 109 male and 20 female homeless individuals were assessed at baseline and at 1- and 3-year follow-up concerning mental illness (SCID-I), psychopathology, global assessment of functioning, emotional lability and alcohol consumption. Results: A high proportion (86%) of the individuals was able to maintain or im...