BMSC X440.4 - Mental Health Issues in the Homeless Population

Course Description

Explore the roles of mental health, domestic violence, and trauma on the homeless population in America. You will discuss how different cities in the country are addressing homelessness, including services provided and the roles of law enforcement and the judicial systems. We will go over basic tenets of mental health assessment and intervention with chronically homeless individuals. Additionally, we will focus on the two predominant approaches to treating homelessness:

• treatment first
• housing first

We will discuss the challenges of each approach, and narrow our focus on the chronically homeless--accounting for only 15% of the overall population, yet consuming more than 50% of available resources.