Peer Outreach Support Teams (POST)

Peer Support is not a new concept.  The field of addictions introduced the concept of integrating peer workers into the service delivery team.  This concept formally expanded to the mental health field during the 1980's when mental health consumers began demonstrating the value of the peer worker’s input in programming, support services, and policy development.  NJ consumers began working and volunteering throughout the state.

The Mental Health Association in Atlantic County [MHAAC] has long history of creating job opportunities for consumers of mental health services, who are people who have themselves experienced mental illness.  In 1986, the first Peer Outreach Support Team was created, by consumers working with the Mental Health Association in Atlantic County.  The program employs trained staff, who provide outreach services to those unwilling, unable, or unmotivated to leave their homes.  They also provide in-home peer counseling to consumers in crises and help with their recovery process.  Home visits and referrals mimic existing professional services with a twist, peers helping peers. 

The purpose of a Peer Outreach Support Team is to work towards addressing the needs of an increasing number of consumers who lack the resources, knowledge or skills needed to the make those next steps on their road to recovery.  Consumer-providers offer other mental health consumers assistance in linking to concrete services, advocate with consumers on both an individual and systems level, and serve as role models. 

The Atlantic County POST staff gained a reputation for providing services to consumers needing assistance, which enable them to remain in the community. There is an increasing number of consumers being referred who do not meet the criteria for PACT or ICMS.  However these referrals do need some concrete services.  Many of these referrals need short-term interventions to stabilize a current crisis or to overcome a roadblock, while the smaller number are in need of more intense long term services. 

Consumer-providers who currently work on the POST teams have demonstrated that, they are sometimes better able to engage consumers in services, due to their knowledge of the mental health system from a consumer perspective.  Consumer-providers allow consumers to see that mental illnesses are cyclical, that consumers are capable of doing things that in the past were only within the scope of the “professional,” and that having a mental illness does not diminish their ability to do a job.  This is empowering for consumers who have not worked or are not in the workforce.  Providing consumers with positive role models is a real advantage of a POST program. 

For more information on Peer Outreach Support Teams contact Jaime Angelini, MA