Employing Youth Mental Health First Aid in the Foster Care and Adoption Community

Background and Purpose: Children involved with the child welfare system have a higher incidence of mental health challenges, and it remains their number one unmet need. Foster, kinship, and adoptive (resource) parents are often left to handle these challenges without training. This project aims to implement an evidence-based practice to increase mental health literacy for resource parents. Materials and Methods: An agency in the southwest region of the United States that supports and trains resource parents provided training in Youth Mental Health First Aid (YMHFA). IRB approval from Arizona State University for an exempt status was secured. Six resource parents consented to participate in this evidence-based project using the Mental Health Literacy Scale (MHLS) via a pre- and post-questionnaire to evaluate the effectiveness of YMHFA training. All participants who completed the course received a certification in YMHFA. Survey Monkey was used to send the pre and post-MHLS questionnaire to those participants who consented to participate. Results: Descriptive statistics and a two-tailed paired samples t-test using Intellectus Statistics‚Ñ¢ were completed. Caucasian female participants 4 (67%) made up the majority of participants. The results were insignificant based on an alpha value of 0.10, t(5) = 1.97, p =.107, indicating the null hypothesis cannot be rejected but is moving towards significance. Discussion and Conclusion: The finding suggests the difference in the pre and post-MHLS was not significant from zero, but the effect outcome variable was high, d=0.80, indicating it was moving towards significance. The impact of this study is that training may increase resource parent's ability to recognize signs and symptoms of mental health challenges.