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Mental health courts have recently emerged with goals to reduce recidivism and improve clinical outcomes for people with serious mental illness in the criminal justice system. The present study is a review of mental health court literature assessing their effectiveness in reducing recidivism and improving clinical outcomes for participants using meta-analytic techniques. A total of 20 studies that included sufficient information to compute the standardized mean difference effect size, focused on adult populations, and were within the United States were included in the analysis. Only experimental and quasi-experimental research designs were obtained. Using Cohen's d (1988) guidelines, mental health courts were found to have a small effect on reducing recidivism (0.32, p<.05) and a nonsignificant effect for improving clinical outcomes for participants. Several moderator analyses were conducted and indicated that the nature of the control group (whether they were a treatment as usual or participants who "opted-out") was found to be significant between groups (Q=22.33, p<.001) as a possible moderating effect.

The purpose of this research study is to understand the characteristics of the people arrested for felony charges and transferred into the Broward County Felony Mental Health Court (FMHC) program. This research project will review previously collected data on the subjects who participated in the FMHC program between January 2007 and September 2008, and who were diverted to a residential dual-diagnosis program. Problem-solving courts have been developed in many states as a way to effectively restore offenders and reduce recidivism (Stefan & Winick, 2005). The goal of mental health courts is to prevent criminal behavior and recidivism by accommodating necessary mental health services to those who need it. However, most offenders placed in a mental health program commit new violations or offenses. A frequent question that is raised when evaluating mental health courts is whether they are successful in allocating resources for mentally ill defendants, as well as whether jail diversion programs are effective in preventing recidivism or rehabilitating mentally ill offenders. The difficulty to find answers for those questions may be due to the diversity of each jurisdiction's population, complexity of mental illnesses and differences in each unique jail diversion program. Some reports state that in contrast to drug courts, current mental health courts seem to lack resources to assess the participation of services mandated (Steadman, Davidson & Brown, 2001.) In this current study, the data collected on the subjects is comprehensive and include criminal, family, trauma, abuse and psychiatric histories. The levels of compliance were taken from re-arrests records including new crimes and violations of probation for up to two years after entering the jail-diversion program. This study is seeking to investigate the relationship between recidivism and different diagnoses, types of trauma experienced as a child as well as trauma scales from the Trauma Symptom Inventory (TSI.) It is hypothesized that elevated scores on trauma scales as well as early exposure of abuse will be related to high recidivism among a subset of participants in the mental health court program.

Chemical dependency in the health profession is a growing concern. With easy access to controlled substances, many nurses divert prescription drugs and even work while under the influence. Nurses who are under the influence and working with patients are an obvious public hazard. Many states in the USA have non-punitive programs to offer recovery to nurses with chemical dependency and return them to work. In California this program is named the Diversion Program. Part of the requirements of successful completion of the Diversion Program is to attend weekly meetings called support groups. These support groups are facilitated by other nurses experienced in the field of chemical dependency. This study explored the experiences of nurse facilitators of support groups for nurses with chemical dependency in the California, USA, Diversion Program. Data were collected through twelve individual interviews selected through purposeful, non-probability convenience sampling. A phenomenological research design was used that was descriptive, explorative, and contextual. The data analysis revealed four major themes: (1) experience of communication within the Diversion Program; (2) experience of the structure of the Diversion Program; (3) experience of their role within the Diversion Program; and (4) experience of facilitation of support groups. The study revealed that even though many of the nurse facilitators‟ experiences were positive with respect to the support groups they expressed concern about the communication patterns within the Diversion Program. To offer support for the nurse facilitators, guidelines and a conceptual framework were created to enhance their experience and mitigate their feelings of marginalization from the Diversion Program. / Health Studies / D.Litt. et Phil. (Health Studies)

Chemical dependency in the health profession is a growing concern. With easy access to controlled substances, many nurses divert prescription drugs and even work while under the influence. Nurses who are under the influence and working with patients are an obvious public hazard. Many states in the USA have non-punitive programs to offer recovery to nurses with chemical dependency and return them to work. In California this program is named the Diversion Program. Part of the requirements of successful completion of the Diversion Program is to attend weekly meetings called support groups. These support groups are facilitated by other nurses experienced in the field of chemical dependency. This study explored the experiences of nurse facilitators of support groups for nurses with chemical dependency in the California, USA, Diversion Program. Data were collected through twelve individual interviews selected through purposeful, non-probability convenience sampling. A phenomenological research design was used that was descriptive, explorative, and contextual. The data analysis revealed four major themes: (1) experience of communication within the Diversion Program; (2) experience of the structure of the Diversion Program; (3) experience of their role within the Diversion Program; and (4) experience of facilitation of support groups. The study revealed that even though many of the nurse facilitators‟ experiences were positive with respect to the support groups they expressed concern about the communication patterns within the Diversion Program. To offer support for the nurse facilitators, guidelines and a conceptual framework were created to enhance their experience and mitigate their feelings of marginalization from the Diversion Program. / Health Studies / D.Litt. et Phil. (Health Studies)