Core Orientation & Clinical Skills for Direct Care Staff

The Core Orientation & Clinical Skills Workgroup is advising the development of the orientation and competencies. This project has been completed and is not currently active.

The goal of the Vermont Cooperative for Practice Improvement is to develop core orientation and competency materials for direct care staff of all kinds. This is one way of creating value for our members and developing a co-operative approach to helping all of our workforce understand value driven and recovery oriented practice.

This project is exploring these critical questions:

What are the priorities and kinds of core orientation content and knowledge we want to direct care staff to receive upon hire?

How do we help people learn “value-driven” practice? Practice that is welcoming, helpful, strengths-based

What will be most helpful and have the most positive impact on quality of services?

What do our members see as the greatest value?

Vermont Cooperative for Practice Improvement and Innovation and consultants are working with the Core Orientation & Clinical Skills Workgroup and Advisory Committee to develop and disseminate a set of Core Orientation and Clinical Skills for direct care staff that are values-based and resiliency and recovery-oriented. VCPI established an Advisory Committee representative of statewide stakeholders to oversee the overall development of the Core Orientation materials and format. VCPI will facilitate the dissemination and implementation of the core orientation and skills materials to support the widespread adoption and utilization of these materials.

Development of the core orientation and skills materials will utilize existing research, programming and resources specific to community mental health and stakeholder input from Vermont providers, individuals with the lived experience, family members, and other stakeholders. A subcommittee has been established, expected to roll out Module I of the Core Orientation, focused around our Vermont System of Care’s values, principles and beliefs, in 2018.

Inspiring Content:

• Opportunities for staff to hear from consumers/families about their experiences

• Systems partnerships

• Resources that are available

• Tips & Tricks for avoiding burnout & compassion fatigue

• “Things I Wish I knew”

• Language/person-first

• Trauma Informed Care

• Strengths based

• Person-centered planning

• Learning from the lived experience

Required Content:

• Overview of our system of care

• EMR

• HIPPA/BBP

• Cultural Diversity

• Documentation

• Data