August kicks off the 1999-2000 NAMI North Carolina Annual Fund Campaign. As you contemplate your level of contribution to NAMI North Carolina, I challenge you to think about "what’s it worth to ya?"

NAMI North Carolina has touched the lives of over 1000 families through its Family-to-Family Education and Support Programs, programs that literally have changed and saved lives. Family-to-Family programs are offered free to all participants.

Currently, 84 Family-to-Family Educators and 33 Support Facilitators have been trained by NAMI North Carolina to serve 29 communities across the state. By the end of the year, the Family-to-Family Education course will be available in 37 communities.

NAMI North Carolina’s innovative Young Families Programs are reaching hundreds of young families in desperate need of support, education, and personal advocacy to assist them and their young children to cope with severe emotional disorders. This fall, an educational program for teachers and other school personnel will be launched to teach them about severe emotional disorders, and how to respond to and support these children and their families.

Some NAMI North Carolina supporters have been direct recipients of these services and know how valuable they are. Other supporters may not have needed these services, but isn’t it great to know that these wonderful services are there, helping people in need and furthering our mission to improve the lives of people with mental illnesses?

NAMI North Carolina’s service programs are worth a lot. But, it is only because of the generous contributions from our members and supporters that we can offer these critical services. We need your help to enable NAMI North Carolina to do what it does best...educating, supporting, advocating for people with mental illnesses and their families.

So what’s NAMI North Carolina worth to ya? A lot. Please give generously.

Dr. H. David Bruton, Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, has called on the North CarolinaInstitute of Medicine to establish a blue ribbon Child Health Task Force to develop a blueprint to improve children’s health in North Carolina.

NAMI North Carolina Executive Director Beth Melcher has been named to the task force and will serve as chair of the mental health subcommittee.

Said Melcher, "It is an honor to serve in this capacity and to have the opportunity to address the range of mental health needs of children in North Carolina at the highest level of policy discussion. We have the opportunity to make recommendations that can truly improve the lives of children with mental health needs."

Do the terms, ‘system reform,’ ‘design team,’ ‘auditor’s report,’ ‘performance contract,’ and ‘utilization management RFP’ have you totally confused? Do you wonder what the future holds for the public mental health system? Well, you are not alone.

Come to the NAMI North Carolina Fall Institute, a full day of learning from the people who are at the center of reform efforts. The institute will be held Saturday, October 23 at Wayne Community College.

Speakers will include Dr. Stephen Preas who will provide an overview of mental health economics; Marti Knisley of The Technical Assistance Collaborative, who will provide an overview of reform efforts in other states; State Auditor Ralph Campbell, to review his study; and Flo Stein, chair of the Design Team effort.

Workshops will be focused on how to be involved at the local level, including issues to concentrate on for those serving on or monitoring area boards; serving on or establishing Human Rights committees; interfacing with legislators; and understanding current initiatives already under implementation.

Unfortunately, the decision that new housing for persons with mental illness in North Carolina will come through adult care homes flies in the face of known research. Mini-institutions are not one of the models which have proven efficacy, nor do many individuals desire this kind of home. Providing appropriate housing requires a broad-based, collegial effort to achieve the diverse housing stock needed. To allow the long-term care industry the chance to provide this housing in adult care homes seems ingenuous at best.

There will be consequences to this legislation, both intended and unintended. For example, as these enlarged adult care homes become a reality, local area programs will be forced to deal with a substantial increase in those individuals needing service, but no funding for services was included. There is much work to be done to mitigate the consequences of this hasty legislation and NAMI North Carolina means to be part of the solution.

For the fiscal year starting July 1, 1999, Virginia will increase funding for mental illness medication, including drugs for schizophrenia, by $5 million, to $11.2 million. In 1998, the state began monitoring 49 mentally ill patients who switched to the newer drugs for two years. It found a 70% reduction in the average number of days spent in the hospital and an average medical savings of $6,000 per person, says David Ziegler, executive director of Northwestern Community Services.

An in-kind contribution of office furniture from First Citizens Bank & Trust was inadvertently omitted when we published the list of donors to NAMI North Carolina in our July/August issue of Clippings.

First Citizens Bank graciously allowed us to select several pieces of good, used office furniture including two desks, a computer table and several secretarial chairs.

We are grateful for First Citizens’ generous contribution of this office furniture.

 NAMI North Carolina Executive Director Beth Melcher was an invited panelist at the 1999 North Carolina Institute of Medicine Annual Conference held in Raleigh on July 26,1999. The panel focused on the topic Solving the Mental Health Dilemma: Institutional versus Community Care.

Melcher reviewed the legacy of deinstitutionalization and reminded those in attendance that as we try to "fix" the mental health system, "we should never be so arrogant as to think we know it all. We should never be so arrogant as to make decisions without the meaningful input of people with mental illness and their families. Their perspectives and life experiences keep us honest and rooted in reality."

Melcher’s presentation outlined the treatment and support services proven to help people with mental illness recover and help their families cope more effectively. But, she stated, "What we know and what we do are far apart." Melcher urged strong leadership and commitment on the part of the governor, legislature, providers, families, and consumers to address the needs of people with mental illness.

Gifts made by will are one of NAMI North Carolina’s most common form of planned gifts. Bequests enable donors of any age and financial circumstance to make larger gifts while passing assets to family members at a reduced tax cost.

Many donors would like to make larger gifts, but find it difficult to commit the time and resources to estate planning. Some even think that their estate is not worth the effort. Yet for people who leave dependents, this can be devastating.

A person who does not set up a will is leaving the division of his or her estate—be it large or small—up to the discretion of the state. The division of the estate is dictated by state laws with percentages going to surviving relatives regardless of need or personal relationship. Furthermore, your loved ones can be faced with estate taxes and delayed income due to probate issues. Federal estate tax rates range from 37% to 55%.

A deferred gift is a convenient way to make a greater impact on NAMI North Carolina while providing for your loved ones. Deferred gifts—bequests (wills) or life insurance, for example—are good complements to outright gifts. They allow the donor to make a vital contribution to NAMI North Carolina’s growth, often without affecting current cash flow. Furthermore, such a gift can provide dramatic estate and inheritance tax savings, and can help ensure NAMI North Carolina’s long-range financial security.

An attorney can provide the necessary guidance in meeting your personal objectives through your will. In most cases, an attorney can assist with determining the best arrangements in and the most appropriate wording of your will.

Bequests can be made as a specific gift of cash or property or as a percentage of the remainder in an estate. The following is the basic wording for a bequest to NAMI North Carolina:

I, ___________________ (donor’s name), hereby give, devise and bequeath to NAMI North Carolina, a nonprofit organization operating under the laws of North Carolina, the sum of ______________________________ (or the remainder of my estate or ___% of my estate) to be used for the general purposes of NAMI North Carolina.

While bequests are the most common planned gift, a number of gift strategies exist to provide support for donors, family, friends and charity. With certain contribution arrangements donors can preserve more of their assets and ensure that their property goes to the people they want to have it. NAMI North Carolina can work with donors and their advisors to set up a strategy that is suited to them. Zanna Cipriani

Family-to-Family classes will begin in September in the following locations:

Durham (919)489-0514

Morganton (828)437-1210

Asheboro (336)495-1017

Boone (828)264-7815

Wilson (252)243-4699

The promise of the internet is not that it brings you face to face with the world, but that it can bring people together, heart to heart.

NAMI National has an excellent website. Not surprisingly, it includes the NAMI Consumer Council's own page. The address is http://www.nami.org/council

The Council’s page contains the names of Council members, the minutes of meetings, the Council’s involvement statement, programs, mailing lists, resources, and yes... links! Although this site is under construction (meaning it isn’t quite finished), soon these addresses can link you to all kinds of sites of interest to advocates.

The Council has some advice for those without computers:

The best place to start in your search for free internet access is your local public library. Most libraries allow patrons to use their computers, and most require that you schedule an appointment. This is a free public service.

Some community mental health centers offer internet access to their clients. Check with your case manager or rehab worker to see if yours does.

Most cities and some smaller towns have "internet cafes." These are like coffee shops where—for an hourly fee—you can use a computer to surf the web and check your email.

Also, we would like to add that psychosocial clubhouses or the NC Division of Vocational Rehabilitation might offer use of a computer, onsite.

NAMI NC Board Member 

Next Consumers News article:  How Do I Get Free Email?

The U.S. Justice Department has released the findings of a comprehensive study of the growing number of emotionally disturbed people in the nation’s jails and prisons. There are 283,800 inmates with severe mental illness, which is about 16% of the total jail population. This study confirms that jails and prisons have become the nation’s new mental hospitals.

Details of the report include how emotionally disturbed inmates are caught up in the revolving door of the criminal justice system. This door revolves from homelessness to incarceration and then back to the streets. Little or no treatment is offered to those who commit crimes that grow out of their illnesses.

Mentally ill inmates in state prisons are twice as likely to have been homeless before their arrest than other inmates. Mentally ill inmates are twice as likely to have been physically and sexually abused in childhood and far more likely to have been on drugs or alcohol.

Kay Jamison, professor of psychiatry at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine says, "This study provides data to show that the incarceration of the mentally ill is a disastrous, horrible social issue."

Public mental hospitals have gone from a high population of 559,000 in 1955 to 69,000 in 1995.

Medications do work when taken, but many states failed to build a promised network of clinics to monitor patients. For-profit hospitals have begun turning away the psychotic.

Linda Teplin, a professor of psychiatry and director of the psycho-legal studies program at Northwestern University says, "Jails have become the poor person's mental hospital." Previous estimates of the number of mentally ill inmates have been based on her research in the Cook County Jail in Chicago. She found that 9.5 % of the male inmates there had experienced a severe mental disorder like schizophrenia, manic depression or major depression—four times the rate in the general population.

Teplin said that she welcomes the Justice Department count, but it was open to question because the study relied on reports by the inmates themselves. People with emotional disorders are often not aware that they are ill. The number of more than a quarter of a million inmates with mental illness may in fact be too low.

One of the most disputed findings in the study is that mentally ill inmates were more likely to have been incarcerated for a violent crime than other inmates. The report found that 13.2% of mentally ill inmates in prisons had been convicted of murder, compared with 11.4% of other prisoners.

Although 22.6% of white state prisoners were identified as mentally ill, only 13.5% black prisoners were found to have mental illness. Dr. Dorothy Otnow-Lewis, a psychiatrist, says that the differences were a result of white psychiatrists "being very bad at recognizing mental illness in minority individuals." According to Otnow-Lewis, psychiatrists are more likely to dismiss aggressive behavior in men, especially black men, as a result of being bad, rather than being mad.

Michael Faenza, president of the National Mental Health Association, said the finding that mentally ill inmates tend to have more previous incarcerations that other prisoners "shows that the criminal justice system is just a revolving door for a person with mental illness, from the state to jail and back without treatment."

—The New York Times, July 12, 1999

Identifying genes for bipolar disorder will have important implications for education, prediction, prevention and treatment of the disorder.

Columbia University-New York State Psychiatric Institute (NYSPI) is currently seeking families with at least two living members who have had a manic or schizo-affective manic episode (with or without depression) to participate in a Bipolar Genetic Study.

The two family participants can include a parent/child, siblings, grandparent/grandchild, or an aunt or uncle/niece or nephew.

Participants in the study will be interviewed by phone and must provide a sample of blood, which is arranged and paid for by the study. An honorarium will be given to all participants of the study.

With Matisha Brown’s departure as Family-to-Family project coordinator, NAMI North Carolina has reviewed the current and future needs of the program. It has become clear that we are coming out of the "start-up" phase, and, while continuing to expand into new communities, our focus now is primarily on maintaining the Family-to-Family program.

An ever-increasing overlap exists between the Family-to-Family program and membership activities. Family-to-Family is our largest membership outreach program and the extent to which we are successful in encouraging affiliates to integrate participants into the life of the affiliate will determine how the membership of our organization will grow.

As a result, the leadership of the Family-to-Family program and that of membership development have been merged under the direction of Beth Greb, who has been the Membership Development Coordinator at NAMI North Carolina on a part-time basis.

As many of you know, Beth provided the leadership to institute the Family-to-Family program back in 1996, and was one of the primary authors of the support training curriculum. Beth has agreed to increase her time beginning September 1, so she may successfully respond to the demands of this new position.

Are you interested in some of the latest information on research in mental illness?

NARSAD, the National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression, is on-line. The website contains newsletter articles, provides grant information (for researchers), as well as a Study Search bulletin board where researchers recruit participants.

NARSAD also keeps its brochures about mental illness (in Spanish and in English) posted on the site, along with Frequently Asked Questions and Coming Events pages.

Check it out at— www.mhsource.com/narsad.html