Supporting a loved one with a serious mental illness can be extremely difficult. To help caregivers during this challenging time, we’re proud to introduce our new Family and Caregiver Training and Support (FACTS) Program, a hub for evidence-informed, reliable information, resources, and skills training specifically for families, caregivers, or anyone supporting an adult loved one who is living with a serious mental health condition.

We know from decades of research that effective family and caregiver involvement in a patient’s treatment supports recovery, improves social connections, and decreases mental health crises. It also improves family and caregiver well-being, but despite their desire to help, many caregivers don’t have access to reliable education, training, or resources to step into this critical role.

That’s where we come in. The FACTS Program, led by Mollie Forrester, MSW, LICSW and funded through donations from grateful families, provides a space where patients, families, caregivers, and clinicians can learn from each other on how to best support patients and each other. We aim to combine the expertise of UW Medicine’s clinicians and researchers with the life experiences of patients and caregivers into a real-world training program for the entire care team.

Our first training program – Communication Strategies for Families and Caregivers – is a four-part series teaching caregivers how to have more effective conversations with their loved one, especially when things get tense or the topic is hard. The training is offered asynchronously and online, in brief modules that can be taken whenever it is most convenient, to fit into caregivers’ busy lives. The pilot evaluation will assess whether this approach is acceptable to caregivers and if it’s feasible for future training modules. This training is funded by an Innovation Grant from the Garvey Institute for Brain Health Solutions.

The FACTS Program’s new website also includes links to valuable information such as resources to help people navigate the behavioral health system at UW Medicine, a simplified description of the Involuntary Treatment Act process, and additional tools to support caregivers. There is information about other family and caregiver focused programs that are more diagnosis specific including Psychosis REACH offered by our department’s SPIRIT Center, and The Memory Hub which is part of the Memory and Brain Wellness Clinic at Harborview. We also produced this short video to show families and caregivers what they can expect while their loved one is receiving care at the Center for Behavioral Health and Learning (CBHL).

Currently, the FACTS Program is focused on services available at CBHL on the UW Medical Center’s Northwest campus. This beautiful new facility offers a unique opportunity to innovate and fundamentally change how we engage with the families and caregivers of the patients in our care. CBHL’s welcoming environment, patient- and family-centered model of care, and interdisciplinary approach to healing and supportive leadership, including Administrator of Behavioral Health Services Charity Holmes, RN, MSN and UWMC Chief of Psychiatry Ryan Kimmel, MD, made it a great location to launch the FACTS Program.

As the FACTS Program grows, we plan to add more psychoeducation and skill building courses, family peer support groups, and ultimately create a collaborative learning environment for patients, families, and caregivers as well as the interdisciplinary healthcare teams who care for them. We also hope to expand the FACTS Program across all UW Medicine hospital- and clinic-based services so no matter where the patient is in care – at CBHL, Harborview Medical Center, or one of our outpatient care clinics – the FACTS Program will be there to help.

To learn more about the FACTS Program, please contact Mollie Forrester at mgforr@uw.edu.