Banking on KC – Susan Lewis of Mental Health America of the Heartland
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Kelly Scanlon:
Welcome to Banking on KC. I'm your host, Kelly Scanlon. Thank you for joining us. With us on this episode is Susan Lewis, the President and CEO of Mental Health America of the Heartland. Welcome, Susan.
Susan Lewis:
Thank you for having me, Kelly.
Kelly Scanlon:
This is an organization that goes back more than a hundred years, does very important work. Why don't you give us a high-level overview of the mission of MHAH?
Susan Lewis:
Happy to. Mental Health America of the Heartland exists to promote the mental health of the community and also improve the quality of life for persons with mental illness. And we do that through advocacy, education, and support. That's our three-legged stool.
Kelly Scanlon:
It's over a hundred years old. It has a really interesting history. First the age of it. A hundred years ago people were paying attention to mental health. And then second, the founder himself had been institutionalized. Tell us about that.
Susan Lewis:
Clifford Beers was our founder, and he was an individual who, like many people, developed a mental illness in his late teens, early twenties. He happened to be from a very wealthy family, so he got the swankiest, top-notch mental health treatment of the time, right up until the money ran out, and then he ended up in the public mental health system. He ended up institutionalized in a state hospital, which in 1900 was a pretty horrific place.
Like many people, most people with mental illness, despite being sick, he was still very, very bright. He began chronicling his experiences and those of fellow patients. I've read his autobiography several times, still have not figured out how he managed to get out of the psychiatric hospital. But when he did, he shared his experiences with friends and family and his community and founded what was then called the Mental Hygiene Movement. That was in 1909.
Kelly Scanlon:
And where was this taking place?
Susan Lewis:
This was all happening in Connecticut.
Kelly Scanlon:
Connecticut.
Susan Lewis:
But, by 1916, it was percolating through the United States, and here in Kansas City, our roots as Mental Health America of the Heartland date all the way back to 1916. I would love to think that Clifford's story is ancient history, but sadly, we still see families who face bankruptcy, who can't get the services they need. But, to the good, we see folks who are using tools like journaling, who are using support of their peers, and who are using the partnerships and the caring of their communities to further their recovery, and we're still doing grassroots organizing.
Kelly Scanlon:
Yes, you are, and you have several different programs that fit within the three buckets that you mentioned earlier. Qhat are some of those programs that help you and your team there at MHAH carry out your mission?
Susan Lewis:
Sure. Easiest to sort them into four.
We have Heartland Housing, which is forever homes, permanent supportive housing to folks who have a disability, generally mental illness, who have also typically been homeless and are of low income.
We have Mental Health Promotion, which does a plethora of webinars, workshops, health fairs, lunch and learns, et cetera, designed to suit training for pretty much anybody in the community, any group in the community, that's interested.
Kelly Scanlon:
Is that to shed a light on mental illness so that people might recognize the signs of it in their colleagues or in their own family members, friends?
Susan Lewis:
Absolutely. Absolutely. It usually is twofold to do exactly what you said, is help people recognize and identify mental illness in themselves. We've got a tagline before stage four. "You wouldn't wait until stage four for that spot on your arm to turn into a large melanoma. You shouldn't wait until stage four when you're in crisis, feeling suicidal, needing to be hospitalized before you seek some help for mental health." So there's those peeps is helping people understand treatment, access treatment. But a lot of the webinars are designed for social service, mental health professionals, school professionals, to take advantage of the science and the treatment modalities that help people.
Kelly Scanlon:
You've got the housing, you have the educational component, and you mentioned two others.
Susan Lewis:
Sure. We have our Child and Youth Mental Health Initiative, which right now is focusing very, very heavily on elementary age kids by teaching both their school staff and also their parents some strategies to help the kids regulate their emotions, manage their own behavior, et cetera. We like teaching both the school staff and the parents so that everybody's on the same page with the kid.
And then we have our Advocacy and Recovery Services, and one of the cornerstones of that is our Compassionate Ear Warm Line, which operates from 9:00 to 9:00 every single day of the week. It's a warm line. It's not a hotline, it's not crisis. It's all peer support.
So a person calls, they're struggling, maybe they're very, very anxious. They're not in crisis. They don't want to call their therapist. They don't want to call their case manager. It's 7:00 at night. Three or four hours, if they're sitting there stewing in their juices, they will be in crisis. But if they can talk to somebody, a peer who gets it, who's been there, and can remind them of the ways they've coped in the past, or maybe offer them some suggestions that have worked for other folks struggling with the same thing, folks can cope and go on.
Kelly Scanlon:
All of these different programs, you mentioned again the peer support there, your education initiatives, your advocacy, and the housing. How have those programs impacted individuals who are dealing with the mental health challenges that you mentioned?
Susan Lewis:
Boy, so many stories over the years. Our Compassionate Ear Warm Line regularly has people who call and say, "Boy, if it wasn't for you being here, I would've really gone into crisis." We hear those stories all the time. The stories about people who are moved from chronic homelessness into a forever home will warm your heart. We have folks who move into those apartments and have a fully furnished place of their own, and are finally able to work on, not only their mental illness and recovery from that, but the rest of their lives.
Kelly Scanlon:
There really is a direct correlation between mental health and homelessness.
Susan Lewis:
If you think about it, if you're on the street, you probably don't have a calendar or a clock to remember to go to your appointment, and just the sheer stress of being on the street, of not sleeping well, of being cold, of being hassled.
Kelly Scanlon:
Not knowing where your next meal is.
Susan Lewis:
Not knowing where your next meal is, is going to impact your mental health, as well.
Kelly Scanlon:
Sure, sure. You've heard all kinds of stories about how you've been able to move those folks into housing.
Susan Lewis:
Yes, and it's permanent housing. We have folks who have been in their apartments for 20-plus years, just like I've been in my house for 20-plus years. It's a forever home.
Kelly Scanlon:
What are some of the strategies that you use to reach the underserved populations, in particular, and to ensure they have the access to mental health resources?
Susan Lewis:
I would answer partnerships, partnerships, partnerships. We work closely with other social service agencies, designing training for their staff. We work closely with other advocacy organizations. But we work with other groups, but also PTAs, school districts, PEO groups, sororities and fraternities, churches, et cetera-
Kelly Scanlon:
[inaudible 00:07:26].
Susan Lewis:
... to get out there to the people who are touching the people in need.
Kelly Scanlon:
Right, because mental illness doesn't discriminate.
Susan Lewis:
No, it does not.
Kelly Scanlon:
When you mentioned all of those different groups, they don't seem to have a commonality, but it's reaching all different groups of people, because this is pervasive.
Susan Lewis:
Exactly, exactly.
Kelly Scanlon:
What are some of the biggest challenges that the organization faces as you try to provide these services, as you try to get the word out and how are you addressing those?
Susan Lewis:
Any nonprofit is going to say funding, funding, funding. For us, funding is always an issue, because we don't do clinical services. Sometimes folks think you're going to do therapy, and then you're going to get paid by the insurance company. We don't have any billable services, so we are constantly trying to write the grants, develop the contracts, et cetera, and make those work. And sometimes those are very, very limited in terms of what kinds of costs you can put in there, the amount of overhead you can charge. Fortunate that the big challenge that was in place 30 years ago when I got to the position, of stigma and "we don't want to talk about it,"-
Kelly Scanlon:
I was going to ask you about that. How's that?
Susan Lewis:
That is almost completely gone in most populations. But, by and large in America, we have gotten very open about talking.
Kelly Scanlon:
You did mention that you have an advocacy arm, and I believe that's occurring at the local and the state levels, both. Can you bring us up to date on some of your most pressing concerns, and also how the advocacy efforts, I hope you address some of the problems you just mentioned?
Susan Lewis:
Absolutely. Heartland is Kansas and Missouri, so most mental health policy really happens in state houses. We every year make a list of things that we are concerned about that tie to our mission, but also that are kind of hot topics. Housing, making sure that there's adequate housing, funding for housing, particularly permanent housing is always on our list.
We're always interested in furthering peer support, where persons with lived experience are recognized for the value and the knowledge and the skills they bring to a treatment situation, or just any interaction with a person with mental illness, and finding ways for those individuals to be able to be licensed, be credentialed, have support, have professional development.
Workforce is a huge issue right now. Mental health workforce is a massive issue and trying to encourage both state houses to do things like scholarships and various options for individuals who are willing to commit to working in the mental health field, and both sides of the state line are all huge.
And then the one that always crops up every couple of years is medication access. Medication is not the be-all and end-all, but it is often a very critical tool.
Kelly Scanlon:
So access to drugs that will improve the situation. What are some of the different programs? You talked a little bit, in a broad way, about the programs, but specifically the programs that you offer in the community to raise awareness about mental health, and how can various groups or individuals participate in those programs?
Susan Lewis:
We have webinars. We used to go out and about all the time and find a place, but now there's Zoom and so we have 60, 70, a hundred people coming in for a Zoom webinar, and those are on a huge variety of mental health topics. Some are more designed for somebody who is a therapist or a social worker, and they can be anything from food and nutrition, to sleep hygiene, to the newest advances in medication, to the impact of trauma, to ... you name it. You name it.
Kelly Scanlon:
That anybody can-
Susan Lewis:
Anybody can access and watch those. There's a small fee for some of those, because they offer continuing education. We, also, with our Child and Youth Mental Health Initiative, are going into into schools and training teachers, but we will also design workshops, seminars, lunch and learns, come talk to your Sunday school, come talk to your women's or men's group, whatever, and we'll design those for the audience. If you were to say, "Oh, wow, my PTA could really lose-" "Great, which day, what time? How many people, what do you think they need to know about?" And we'll build that out for you.
Kelly Scanlon:
Okay. Do you work with local law enforcement?
Susan Lewis:
Absolutely. Absolutely. We do law enforcement training across the states of Kansas and Missouri over the years. Right now we're heavily in Kansas, and we do an eight-hour workshop helping law enforcement recognize what kind of symptoms that people might be dealing with when they encounter them on the streets. Law enforcement includes first responders. There's EMS in there, and there's jail personnel, et cetera. But also help them to understand how to interact effectively and compassionately and safely with the person who may be in a mental health crisis. Also, just to further understanding of how to connect those folks to resources, what resources are there in the community, how those work, up to and including involuntary commitments. It's a very in-depth, intense eight hours, but makes a huge impact, particularly in some of the smaller jurisdictions.
Kelly Scanlon:
What are some of the key partnerships that enhance your ability to serve the community? You've got these broad groups. What are some of the key ones?
Susan Lewis:
Contact with the community mental health centers that are sort of the sliding scale public mental health system. Obviously in regular contact with them, both because they may be referring people to our housing, they may have their patients in our housing, but also, so that we are very much up to date on what services are available in which part of town, and who do you call, et cetera. Because we also get walk-ins and information and referral kinds of things.
We work heavily with other advocacy organizations, mental health advocacy organizations and physical and mental disability organizations around all our public policy work. All kinds of social service organizations for carrying out many of the workshops and the seminars, but also, in helping folks to navigate the services that would be helpful to them, even outside of traditional mental health services.
Finally, I would be absolutely remiss if I didn't talk about the partnerships with our banking partners, including, of course, Country Club, our funders, which often is also our banking, and our other business partners, our auditors, our insurance agents, all of those organizations, all of those entities, strengthen our ability to carry out our work.
Kelly Scanlon:
When you think about all that still needs to be done, you have limited resources, obviously, as do most social service organizations, but when you think about your goals, which ones are you focused on for the next few years and how do you plan to achieve them?
Susan Lewis:
I don't think I'm premature about this. We've got a partnership with an individual who has been a landlord for low-income persons with mental illness for years, and we've worked with him in that capacity. He has a very neat idea about how to comparatively rapidly and inexpensively build housing for persons with mental illness like the permanent support of housing we do. And so we are working on a model build that would have apartments that are like ours in that they are fully furnished, single occupancy. There's a commons room, there's an on-site residential manager and staff. Not 24/7, but kind of like your building super, who's there for additional support and in case the washing machine breaks. Both of those things. But we are working on that, and it's coming together. The build ought to go fairly quickly, because it's all concrete, which also means it's nearly indestructible.
Kelly Scanlon:
You mentioned earlier that the stigma attached to mental illness is becoming less so. It still exists, so there's still work to do there. However, it has been reduced and more open conversations are occurring. What are some of the other trends like that that you might be able to address, that you either need still significant work or that you see some light at the end of the tunnel, so to speak?
Susan Lewis:
The reduction in stigma is obviously huge.
Kelly Scanlon:
Yes.
Susan Lewis:
We used to kid that we'd go to a health fair in the late nineties and everybody would turn their head and walk past our booth, and now we're just inundated with people who want to talk and who want resources. So that is great. But yes, there are still populations that aren't there yet, and we're actively working with them, again, usually through an organization that they're already comfortable with. So there's that piece.
I am really going off on a tangent here, but one of the trends that I am seeing, and it's a good thing, is that folks with mental health problems, folks with mental illness, serious mental illness, are living longer. Life expectancy is still shorter than average, but it's longer than it was. That's awesome, but it is posing some really thorny problems.
Kelly Scanlon:
For example?
Susan Lewis:
Two things. One, either a person has been maintaining in the community, often in the family home, and they may not have ever gotten connected with the public system, because they're getting their therapy from a private therapist, and they're getting their medication from a private psychiatrist. And now mom and dad, who have been handling a lot of the laundry, the bills, the whatever, the person's been living at home or maybe they've got a small apartment, and mom and dad are taking them grocery shopping or whatever. Mom and dad are now 80.
Kelly Scanlon:
Right, right.
Susan Lewis:
There not be a good plan in place for those folks. Mom and dad are struggling, can no longer manage them in the home.
Kelly Scanlon:
So their support systems are either aging themselves and have their own health issues to deal with or they're dying. It's the support systems both just from daily activities and/or financial.
Susan Lewis:
Right. And so that's a concern. One of the things I would love to get done, and I have got ideas, but I'm not sure that this is going to be my job as the CEO ... maybe the next CEO will get to do this ... is to develop some housing, like our permanent supportive housing for that population. It would look a little different. It would be placed different places. There'd be some different expectations, and the funding mechanisms, it would not be typically governmental funding. That's sort of a pet project.
The other thing is a lot of those folks are ending up in nursing homes.
Kelly Scanlon:
Yes.
Susan Lewis:
Which is a hot mess for the nursing home. They weren't trained. They weren't equipped. A couple years ago we did a lot of work in nursing facilities to help them sort of recognize, understand what they were seeing, figure out how to manage the situation.
Kelly Scanlon:
Susan, a hundred years worth of work, 30 years on your part. Thank you so much for what your organization does, what you have contributed, and thanks for taking the time today to come on the show and tell us all about it.
Susan Lewis:
Thank you so much for having me and for the support of Country Club, for our organization and our community.
Joe Close:
This is Joe Close, President of Country Club Bank. Thank you to Susan Lewis for being our guest on this episode of Banking on KC. For more than 100 years, Mental Health America of the Heartland has been a steadfast advocate for mental health in our community. Under Susan's leadership, the organization has provided essential education, housing, advocacy, and peer support to ensure individuals facing mental health challenges have access to care and resources they need. The work of Susan and her team has made a lasting impact, helping to reduce stigma, promote recovery, and strengthen the support network for countless individuals and families. Organizations like Mental Health America of the Heartland are essential to building a healthier and more resilient Kansas City. By raising awareness, providing resources, and offering support, they're ensuring mental health is prioritized as part of the broader well-being of our community.
Thanks for tuning in this week. We're banking on you, Kansas City. Country Club Bank, member FDIC.