Cook County Behavioral Health Summit

Cook County Health (CCH) Board of Directors Meeting
January 18, 2024

Tom Nutter MD, CCH Chief Behavioral Health Officer, talked about the newly formed CCH Office of Behavioral Health (BH) and the upcoming Cook County (CC) Behavioral Health Summit on February 15, 2024.  Invitations have been extended county-wide to mental health and addiction disorder colleagues to convene together.  The emphasis will be listening sessions from all stakeholders to get feedback on issues such as inequities in BH care, the need for improved BH care and need for increased access to BH care.  This summit will help to develop a CC Behavioral Health Strategic Plan.  There will be upcoming community-based funding opportunities from CC government because of the American Rescue Plan.  The Summit’s listening sessions will also help with guidance for awarding future Behavioral Health grants.  March 6, 2024 will be the date to submit requests for grant funding proposals.

The CCH Board approved a Memorandum of Understanding to be a member of the new corporation, West Side United Not-For-Profit.  Launched in 2018, West Side United is an organization initiated by West Side Health Care Institutions (including CCH), whose main goal is to close the life expectancy gap in the west side diverse neighborhoods of Chicago where there is a high level of poverty.  People in these neighborhoods experience barriers to health and wellness because of education inequities, employment, access to healthy food, safe housing, violence, transportation issues and access to banking.  The founding West Side Health Care Institutions determined that a not-for-profit corporation was needed.  

The CCH’s Patient Bill of Rights & Responsibilities document includes the right to provide “interpreter services, free of charge, including sign language” and information written in other languages.  Two contracts were extended by board approval for phone interpretation, document translation and interpreting services by video remote.

Observed by   Michele Niccolai