Projects
Autism and Skilled Employment
Funded by Oregon Clinical and Translational Research Institute (OCTRI)
The goal of this project is to use a community based participatory research and realist evaluation approach to explore employer needs and develop an intervention to improve workplace culture for autistic professionals by engaging supervisors and managers. It builds on our previous research regarding facilitators of successful employment experiences for autistic professionals and their supervisor, and provides pilot data and researcher training for a larger future intervention to improve employment outcomes for autistic professionals.
Principal Investigator: Dora Raymaker
Behavioral Health Integration Project (BHIP)
Funded by HRSA
The Behavioral Health Integration Project (BHIP) is a 4-year federally funded grant project that offers MSW students who have an interest in working with rural and/or medically underserved populations across the lifespan a unique opportunity to learn about behavioral health. BHIP cohort members are immersed in the philosophical approach of integrated health: to promote individual and community health and wellness by integrating behavioral health and primary care. For the purpose of this grant, medically underserved populations are defined as those with social, economic, cultural, and/or linguistic barriers to accessing health care, such as people of color, LGBTQ2S+ folks, low-income populations, houseless populations, immigrants, and refugees.
Principal Investigator: Dr. Ericka Kimball
Learn more about the Behavioral Health Integration Project (BHIP)
Enhanced Care for Pregnant and Post -Partum Women
Funded by SAMHSA Center for Substance Abuse Treatment
Primary Grantee: Addictions Recovery Center (ARC)
ARC, in collaboration with the Oasis Center for the Rogue Valley, provides enhanced primary care and addiction treatment for pregnant and post-partum women in Medford, Oregon. Enhanced services for infants and family members include primary care and developmental services for substance-exposed infants, wrap-around services provided by a multidisciplinary team providing addiction, mental health, child welfare, and criminal justice supports. This project is conducting a comprehensive evaluation to track outcomes of ARC implementing the NCASW Substance Exposed Infants framework. Southern Oregon suffers under the nationwide opioid crisis, which has had especially devastating effects on pregnant and post-partum women in our community. RRI is providing an external outcome and process evaluation of the grant-funded activities.
Principal Investigator: Karen Cellarius
Learn more about Enhanced Care for Pregnant and Post -Partum Women »
Healthy Transitions Oregon (HT)
Funded by OHA and SAMHSA
The Healthy Transitions Oregon project combines evidence-based practices and innovative, empirically-supported approaches as a means of improving well-being and functioning among youth and young adults. The project is working statewide—with special attention to Lane and Douglas Counties—to focus on improving outcomes for young people ages 16–25 who experience serious mental health conditions and who are disconnected from services and supports (i.e., currently not accessing the continuum of care) or at risk of disconnection.
Principal Investigator: Janet Walker
Integrated Behavioral Health Support for OHSU NICU Families
Funded by NW Center of Excellence & K12 in Patient Centered Learning Health Systems Science
This study examines the parenting and behavioral health needs of parents with children hospitalized in the OHSU neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Qualitative interviews will be conducted with NICU parents and NICU stakeholders (e.g., physicians, nurses, social workers) to identify the parenting and behavioral health needs of NICU parents, as well as to explore the individual- and systems-level barriers and potential solutions to integrating behavioral health support within the NICU. Results from this project will enhance healthcare systems' support of NICU families and ultimately improve patient family outcomes.
Principal Investigator: Susanne Klawetter
Investigating Statewide Patterns of Youth Participation in School and Work
Funded by the Institute for Research on Poverty
Recent research has highlighted the importance of the timing and frequency of dropout on later achievement suggesting that patterns of connectedness and disconnectedness during high school may have meaningful impacts on later academic achievements and workforce participation. There is growing concern that high school students with complex or under-examined patterns of engagement with the school system may fall outside the reach of current policies and programs related to dropout or the post-secondary transition. We use 10 years of cross-sector linked administrative data to: (1) Describe the patterns of academic and workforce engagement, disengagement, and reengagement among adolescents and into early adulthood; and (2) Test whether those patterns relate to the odds of future participation in school or the workforce.
Principal Investigator: Mathew Uretsky
LEKT Healthy Transitions Program
Funded by SAMHSA Center for for Mental Health Services
Primary Grantee: Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe
The Lower Elwha Klallam Social Services Department's Healthy Transitions program provides wraparound mental health treatment and support services throughout Clallam County on the northern end of Washington's Olympic Peninsula. Its population of focus is youth and young adults, ages 16‐25, who have a serious emotional disturbance (SED) or a serious mental illness (SMI). This focus includes those with intellectual developmental disabilities, substance use disorders, and co‐occurring disorders. It is expected that this program will improve emotional and behavioral health functioning so that youth and young adults can maximize their potential to lead full and productive lives. RRI is providing an external outcome and process evaluation of the grant-funded activities.
Principal Investigator: Karen Cellarius
Linn Together
Funded by Drug Free Communities
Linn Together provides substance use education, resources, and support to the community that promote the physical and emotional well-being of youth and their families in Linn County, Oregon. In the past, Linn Together had an active membership. However, as long-time members began to retire from their positions and the COVID-19 pandemic pulled members that were essential workers into different positions, our lack of new members impacted Linn Together’s capacity to work in the community. RRI will assist the recruitment & retention workgroup to help strengthen Linn together and reflect the diversity of the community by providing a member skill and assessment survey and annual coalition assessment and listening sessions.
Principal Investigator: Aliza Tuttle
Learn more about Linn together »
Measuring Health, Function, and Social Well-being in Adults on the Autism Spectrum
Funded by the National Institute of Mental Health
People on the autism spectrum experience a “services cliff” when they transition to adulthood, and have poor health and social outcomes over the life course. Thankfully, researchers and service providers are starting to focus more attention on services for autistic adults. However, we can’t tell if these services work unless we know how to accurately measure the outcomes that matter. Our objective is to create and test the AutPROM Toolbox, a complete package of accessible survey instruments that researchers can use to accurately measure the outcomes that are most important to autistic adults. We expect to make the AutPROM Toolbox widely available so that other researchers and services providers can use these survey instruments to evaluate the effectiveness of services for autistic adults.
Principal Investigator: Christina Nicolaidis, MD, MPH
Learn more about the AASPIRE Outcome Measurement Project »
The National Wraparound Initiative (NWI)
Funded by SAMHSA
Since 2004, the National Wraparound Initiative has worked to promote understanding about the components and benefits of care coordination using the Wraparound practice model, and to provide the field with resources and guidance that facilitate high quality and consistent Wraparound implementation.
Principal Investigator: Janet Walker
Learn more about the National Wraparound Initiative »
Northwest MHTTC: Mental Health Technology Transfer Center, Region 10
Funded by SAMHSA
The Mental Health Technology Transfer Centers are a national network of 10 regional Centers supporting resource development and dissemination, training and technical assistance, and workforce development for the mental health field. MHTTCs work with systems, organizations, and treatment practitioners involved in the delivery of mental health services to strengthen their capacity to deliver effective evidence-based practices to individuals. PSU collaborates with University of Washington in the Region 10 Center, with PSU’s work focusing on developing the peer support workforce.
Principal Investigator: Janet Walker
Learn more about Northwest MHTTC »
OHA’s Garrett Lee Smith Youth Suicide Intervention & Prevention Initiative
Funded by SAMHSA
Primary Grantee: Oregon Health Authority (OHA) Injury & Violence Prevention Program (IVPP)
OHA's Garrett Lee Smith Youth Suicide Intervention & Prevention Initiative promotes suicide prevention and early intervention strategies for youth, age 10‐24, in schools, educational institutions, juvenile justice systems, substance use programs, mental health programs, foster care systems, and other child and youth‐serving organizations. Grant-funded Youth Suicide Prevention coordinators have been located in the following counties: Deschutes, Jackson, Josephine, Lane, Multnomah, Umatilla, and Washington. Current (2020-2024) grant-funded coordinators are located in Deschutes, Lane, and Multnomah Counties. RRI is providing an external outcome and process evaluation of the grant-funded activities.
Principal Investigator: Karen Cellarius
Learn more about OHA’s Garrett Lee Smith Youth Suicide Intervention & Prevention Initiative »
OHA Zero Suicide Initiative
Funded by SAMHSA Center for Mental Health Services
Primary Grantee: Oregon Health Authority (OHA) Injury & Violence Prevention Program (IVPP)
OHA's Zero Suicide Initiative promotes the implementation of the Zero Suicide framework in Oregon hospitals and health systems. Funded activities include bringing a Zero Suicide Academy to Oregon as well as suicide prevention, intervention, and postvention trainings for clinicians and gatekeepers. Priority populations for this suicide prevention grant are older adults, Veterans and people who have served in the military as well as adults with serious mental illness. RRI is providing an external outcome and process evaluation of the grant-funded activities.
Principal Investigator: Karen Cellarius
OnTrack Rogue Valley’s Residential Treatment HOME Program
Funded by SAMHSA CSAT PPW Residential Treatment Grant
The Regional Research Institute for Human Services at Portland State University is conducting a comprehensive outcome and process evaluation of OnTrack Rogue Valley’s HOME Residential Treatment Program for pregnant and postpartum women and their minor children. HOME is a 24-bed residential substance use disorder (SUD) treatment facility in Medford, Oregon, for moms with their children ages 0-5 designed to keep families united. HOME provides comprehensive SUD treatment, recovery support services, healthcare, mental health services, and harm reduction interventions for pregnant and post-partum women across a continuum of specialty SUD residential care. The program and the evaluation are funded in part by Pregnant and Post-Partum (PPW) Residential Treatment Grant #TI084763 from the Substance Abuse Mental Health Services Administration. The five-year grant goes through September 2027. Through this grant, OnTrack has expanded its partnership with Oasis Center of the Rogue Valley to enhance care coordination. Oasis specializes in primary and post-partum care for individuals with SUD and their children and will provide primary medical, prenatal, postpartum care and medication assisted treatment for women participating in HOME and pediatric care their children.
Principal Investigator: Karen Cellarius
Project Manager Sofia Baldridge
Learn more about OnTrack »
Options CCBHC for Jackson County
Funded by SAMHSA Center for Mental Health Services
Primary Grantee: Options for Southern Oregon
Options CCBHC is a Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinic in Jackson County, Oregon. Funding is provided in part by a CCBHC grant from the US Substance Abuse Mental Health Administration (SAMHSA) awarded to Options for Southern Oregon. Based in Medford, the Center provides comprehensive mental health and addiction services throughout the county. The 3rd round of CCBHC funding from SAMHSA will transform community behavioral healthcare in Jackson County by improving access to responsive and comprehensive behavioral health and co-occurring mental health/substance use disorder services for adults and youth (ages 14+) provided within a trauma informed, equitable and inclusive framework. The RRI is providing an external outcome and process evaluation of the grant-funded activities.
Principal Investigator: Karen Cellarius
Learn more about Options CCBHC for Jackson County »
Oregon Health Authority Comprehensive Suicide Prevention Initiative (CSP)
Oregon Health Authority Comprehensive Suicide Prevention (CSP) Initiative is a 5-year project funded by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The overall project goal is to plan and implement a comprehensive approach to suicide prevention: preventing suicide risk in the first place, supporting people at increased risk of suicide, prevent re-attempts, and supporting loss survivors. Specific strategies to meet these goals include identifying and supporting people at risk and reducing access to lethal means, strengthening access and delivery of sucide care, and creating protective environments. RRI will lead the rigorous evaluation of the overall approach and individual activities, create a feedback system for continuous quality improvement and sustained impact, and communicate the results of the evaluation to stakeholders.
Principal Investigator: Karen Cellarius
Learn more about Oregon Health Authority Comprehensive Suicide Prevention Initiative (CSP) »
Oregon Voices
Funded by The Ford Family Foundation
This project will elevate and sustain the voices of Oregonians, especially an up-to-date picture of the reality of rural lives and communities. We will better understand the assets of, conditions in, and challenges facing rural Oregonians and their communities. Finally, we hope to promote better statewide (urban and rural) civic and policy dialogue around rural issues.
Principal Investigator: Mary Oschwald
Our Lives Safe and Strong Program
Funded by National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research
The Our Lives Toolkit provides access to a gender-specific web-based abuse awareness/ abuse prevention/ safety planning tools. These tools were successfully field-tested with both women and men with disabilities in Centers for Independent Living (CIL) environments and can be used as an integral component of a larger comprehensive approach to supporting anti-violence work.
Principal Investigator: Mary Oschwald
Pathways RTC: The Research and Training Center for Pathways to Positive Futures
Funded by NIDILRR and SAMHSA
Pathways RTC works to improve the lives of youth and young adults who experience serious mental health conditions. We conduct research and offer training and technical assistance on topics such as: increasing providers’ capacities and competencies for working effectively with youth and young adults; increasing young people’s engagement in mental health and related services; providing effective peer support; integrating non-traditional services and supports into the service array; and implementing developmentally appropriate care coordination models.
Principal Investigator: Janet Walker
Learn more about Pathways RTC »
Portland State University Campus Suicide Prevention Collaborative
Funded by SAMHSA
The PSU Campus Suicide Prevention Collaborative is a joint project of the School of Social Work and the Center for Student Health and Counseling (SHAC). It will include students, faculty and staff, providing suicide prevention outreach, training, and services to the 23,979 enrolled students at PSU. The program will develop suggested prevention and postvention protocols for all departments on campus, while also offering Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Trainings to clinical faculty, staff, and students on campus. It will target high-risk groups of students for these prevention strategies, including those in recovery from alcohol or other drug use, those who are veterans or have served in the military, LGBTQ+ students, international students, and students living with autism.
Co-Principal Investigators: Karen Cellarius (RRI) & Marcy Hunt (SHAC)
Grant-funded suicide prevention webinars are now accessible free of cost to PSU and non-PSU community members on PSU's Suicide Prevention Training page:
https://www.pdx.edu/health-counseling/care-ask-connect
Learn more about the Portland State University Campus Suicide Prevention Collaborative »
RISE Support at Outside In
Funded by SAMHSA Center for Mental Health Services
Primary Grantee: Outside In
Outside In's Outpatient Treatment program is designed to help young adults, age 18‐25, in Portland, Oregon who are experiencing homelessness and serious mental illness or co‐occurring disorders. Over the five‐year project period, RISE Support will serve a total of 225 unduplicated homeless youth in outpatient treatment and an additional 125 unduplicated youth in treatment engagement services. Services will be time-unlimited, however generally last from six to eighteen months. RRI is providing an external outcome and process evaluation of the grant-funded activities.
Principal Investigator: Karen Cellarius
Learn more about RISE Support at Outside In »
SUPPORT FOR WORKING CAREGIVERS
Funded by RRICRF
Using data from national surveys of parents reporting on the health and special health care needs of the children and youth in their care, this project will investigate the ways in which parents find a fit between their work and family responsibilities. It will particularly focus on parents providing exceptional care to children and youth who have special health care needs or disabilities and compare their situation to those who provide care to children with typical development. We will also investigate the health care supports, community resources, and social supports that mitigate the impact of the children’s need for exceptional care.
Principal Investigator: Eileen Brennan
Learn more about Support for Working Caregivers »
Support Network Enhancement Intervention for Foster Youth
Funded by National Institute of Mental Health
Through this project, we are developing and pre-testing a new program model to enhance support and well-being among young people in foster care. We are currently designing an evidence-informed program with an advisory group of professionals and young adults with experience in foster care. The program will be group-based and will focus on increasing youth empowerment and improving coping skills and self-efficacy, including enhancing informal support resources and promoting formal help-seeking as needed. The preliminary program will be shared with 40 young people in foster care in Oregon to gather their initial feedback and recommendations for improvement. We will then collect feedback from 40 Oregon professionals working with this population to inform future implementation and testing.
Principal Investigator: Jennifer Blakeslee
The RRI Human Services Implementation Lab (I-Lab)
Helping Community Partners implement evidence-
based and promising practices in human services and prevention
At the I-Lab, we work with community partners in a variety of social service areas to build their capacity for self-evaluation through tool development, facilitated self-assessments and full external assessments of their programs and evidence-based practices. We focus on skill-based evaluation and fidelity assessments across a variety of populations, age ranges and subject areas, including mental health, behavioral health, suicide prevention, trauma informed care, corrections, juvenile justice, residential care, and homelessness.
Director: Karen Cellarius
Learn more about the I-Lab »
Trauma Informed Oregon
Oregon Health Authority Child and Family Behavioral Health
Trauma Informed Oregon serves as a centralized source of information and resources and coordinates and provides training for healthcare and related systems. Trauma Informed Oregon works with state agencies, state and local providers, communities, family and youth organizations, and diverse constituents to bring many voices and perspectives to the table to learn from one another and to advocate for informed policies and practices to promote healing and support wellbeing for all of Oregon’s children, adults, and families. In June of 2014, the Oregon Health Authority, Health Systems Division (formerly Addictions and Mental Health Division), contracted with Portland State University, in partnership with Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU) and the Oregon Pediatric Society (OPS), to initiate a statewide collaboration to promote and sustain trauma informed care across child- and family-serving systems. In July of 2015, the scope of this collaboration was expanded to include adult serving behavioral health systems. Trauma Informed Oregon (TIO) was created in recognition of the impact that adverse experiences in childhood have on long-term health outcomes and represents a commitment at the state level to promote prevention and to bring policies and practices into better alignment with the principles of trauma informed care.
Principal Investigator: Mandy Davis
Learn more about Trauma Informed Oregon »
Yellowhawk Tribal Health Center / Indigenous Project LAUNCH
Funded by SAMHSA
Indigenous Project Launch aims to promote wellness of young children from birth to eight years old within tribes, territories, and Pacific Island jurisdictions. Focuses include physical, social, emotional, cognitive, and behavioral aspects of their development, with the end goals being children thriving in safe, supportive environments, and entering school ready to learn and succeed. Evaluation study findings will help to strengthen early childhood systems, prevention, and health-promotion programming offered by the Yellowhawk Tribal Health Clinic located on the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indians Reservation (CTUIR). Likewise, findings will provide evidence of the positive impacts on children and families when resources focused on early childhood wellness are strengths-based, culturally reflective, and responsive.
Principal Investigator: Lindsay Merritt