Collaborative Care Resources
Collaborative Care Content and Activities
What is Collaborative Care?
Description: Your medical provider has recommended that you participate in Collaborative Care to address your mental health symptoms along with your physical health. Collaborative Care is a team-based treatment approach that can help improve your overall health by integrating your mental and physical health needs by viewing them in a more holistic way. Watch this video to learn more.
What does each person do?
Description: This Journey is designed to help you understand how Collaborative Care works, what each member of the team does, and what you can expect by participating in this treatment journey.
Benefits of Collaborative Care
Description: Collaborative Care has many benefits, including easier access to care and more comprehensive treatment.
Commitment to treatment
Description: YOU are the most important member of the team! We can’t stress enough how important you are to the success of this treatment, since YOU are the only expert on YOU. People who remain engaged and active in treatment tend to see results faster, so your efforts really do payoff. You will meet with your care manager to create a plan with achievable goals and begin taking steps toward a healthier, happier future. Watch this video to learn more.
Getting Started
Description: Mental health issues are very common and affect 1 in 5 adults in the US. Over the next few weeks you’ll meet with your Care Manager to work on building new coping skills. In this journey you will learn about some things you can do to manage difficult changes or life adjustments.
- Video: Physical and Mental Health
Mental Health Treatment
Description: When left untreated, mental health disorders can be chronic and result in bigger issues with family, social and work responsibilities. There are effective treatments available to treat mental health disorders. You will learn more about the available treatments throughout this journey. Watch this video to learn more.
Overview of Journey
Description: So far you have learned about what a mental health disorder is and how it can be treated. Over the next few weeks, you will learn about different ways that have worked for others in treating their mental health disorder. These skills will help you feel better and build confidence that you can be treated.
- Video: Overview of Mental Health
Character Strengths
Description: Mental health disorders affect our thoughts and perceptions about the world and ourselves. One way we can feel better over time is to practice focusing on our character strengths. Watch this video and get ready to share your personal strengths with your care manager.
Identifying Your Strengths
Description: Our strengths protect us against the negative effects of stress. Use the following worksheet to identify your strengths. Share these strengths at your next care manager meeting.
Strengths Journal
Description: Think about moments in your life when you were most productive. Consider the days when it felt like time slipped away. What were you doing? If you could spend the rest of your life doing what you love every day, what would you choose? What internal and external strengths do you have that help you succeed in these passions? Take a moment to journal some of your passions and strengths.
Mindfulness Explained
Description: Mindfulness has been proven to improve mental health. Mindfulness is the practice of noticing what you are thinking and feeling without judgment. Watch this video to learn more.
Mindfulness Practice
Description: Mindfulness can be done at any time of day. It is simply being present in your body and noticing the feelings and thoughts in the body and mind. Watch this video to learn more.
Mindfulness Journal and Summary
Description: Try mindfulness at different times of day and multiple locations. What works best for you? How do you feel after? Take some time to journal about your mindfulness journey so far. After you journal, watch this video to review what you’ve learned so far.
Identifying Feelings
Description: Practicing mindfulness makes us aware of emotions. Once aware, we can get better at saying how we feel with practice. Learning how to identify and express our emotions will help us feel better over time. Watch this video to learn more.
Feelings Wheel
Description: Finding the words for how we feel helps us to be more aware and feel better. Print this worksheet or save it on your phone and use it daily to help identify how you are feeling.
Mindfulness Practice
Description: Mindfulness brings self-awareness and change by bringing your character strengths more clearly into view. It serves as a path to see yourself as you really are. Take some time to journal about your ideal self. What’s the first step you can take to get closer to who you want to be?
What are Thoughts?
Description: To change our thinking, we must first understand what thoughts are and how they function. Thoughts are not facts. Thoughts come from our interpretations of life experiences and they impact how we feel. We can change the way we feel by changing our thoughts. Using mindfulness, take some time today to notice your automatic thoughts and the feelings they bring up.
Automatic Negative Thoughts
Description: A lot of our thoughts are automatic and negative. These automatic negative thoughts (ANTs) pop into our heads before we even know we’re having them. Watch this video to learn how they can strongly affect our moods.
Thought Distortions
Description: Our thoughts can feel very real at times, but believing everything we think can have a negative impact on our mental health. Thought distortions are an example of common thinking patterns we all experience. In general, most people can relate to some type of thought distortion. Look over the handout on thought distortions. Do any of these sound familiar? Read the following handout and write about this in your journal.
Breathing Practice
Description: When learning mindfulness, focusing on breathing is one way to stay in the moment and help your body stay calm. Watch the following video to learn about and practice box breathing.
Emotions Review
Description: When practicing mindfulness, you may notice new feelings. Naming feelings can help you address desires you have for change in your life. Refer to the feelings wheel – place it where you can see it often or save it on your phone – to practice naming emotions. Have you been surprised by any emotions that came up? How do you feel when you name your emotions? Journal your experiences.
Thoughts Review
Description: When practicing mindfulness, you may notice thoughts in your mind as you attempt to remain present. Just notice them. Thoughts are not facts. Thoughts can be automatic, negative, and distorted. Reflect on the common thinking errors and notice if your thoughts follow these patterns. Journal your experiences.
Behavioral Activation
Description: Behavioral Activation is a skill used in the treatment of mental health disorders. It has to do with how behaviors and feelings influence each other, and it is evidence-based (which means it works!). It also aligns with the goals you’ve worked on with your care manager. Watch this video to learn more.
Goal Setting
Description: Setting goals is important and gives you direction. Completing your goals makes you feel good about yourself. This video will help you learn about making a SMART goal. You will work on setting a goal with your Care Manager.
Behavioral Activation Worksheet
Description: Mental health disorders can lead us to stop doing things we used to enjoy or reaching out to family and friends. This can make symptoms worse and make it last longer! Behavioral activation is a strategy for increasing activity levels which can impact mood and energy so we can start feeling better. This worksheet presents ideas on how to practice this new skill.
Setting a Routine
Description: Making a new activity part of your routine is hard. This handout gives you some helpful tips to encourage you to stick with the new activity.
Benefits of Journaling
Description: There are many benefits of journaling. You have been asked to journal as a part of your treatment and may have found this helpful to you. Consistent journaling can improve positive self-talk, help control symptoms, and improve overall mood. It can also promote personal growth. Watch this video to learn more.
Social Support
Description: Making changes to improve mental health is hard work. It takes time and it also takes support. Who are some supports for you? Family? Friends? Coworkers? Jot down some ideas in your journal.
Movement
Description: Physical exercise is a useful way to improve mental health overall. It helps treat current symptoms and avoids mental health issues coming up again in the future. Making physical exercise a part of your routine will keep your body and mind healthy. Look over the handout with your care manager and talk about some ways you could make exercise a part of your routine. Read this handout to learn more.
Self Compassion
Description: Change isn’t a linear process. Sometimes it looks more like a circle. Some days you might feel great. Others not so much. If you need to circle back to a higher level of support that’s okay. How will you know if you need to do that? What are some warning signs?
Gratitude
Description: Gratitude is a felt sense of wonder, thankfulness and appreciation for life. Practicing gratitude can lower negative emotions and has been proven to be beneficial to the mind and body. Start by writing down 3 things you are grateful for every day.
Video: Gratitude
Congratulations on completing the mental health disorder Journey in NeuroFlow! Watch the following video for a summary of what you have learned.