South Bay Mental Health

South Bay Mental Health Center was founded in 1986 in Brockton, Massachusetts, a city of 100,000 approximately 25 miles south of Boston. Under the leadership of Dr. Peter Scanlon, South Bay's original staff of twelve clinicians focused on delivering outpatient mental health services to children and families. South Bay's innovative, community-based approach to services helped eliminate many barriers that prevent and disrupt families from receiving treatment. This approach was immediately successful and sought after by referral agencies.

The success of clinical programs offered in the Brockton area led to requests for services from surrounding communities. In 1990, South Bay opened an outpatient clinic in Plymouth. The Plymouth site quickly grew and led to the opening of a site in Weymouth in 1991. In response to growing requests for services in new communities, South Bay opened clinics in Attleboro, Fall River, South Yarmouth, and Lowell in the early 1990's. To compliment the existing mental health services, South Bay began providing outpatient substance abuse counseling services in 1992.

In 1993, South Bay diversified its programs by expanding into Adult Day Services and Early Intervention. A day treatment program was opened to care for adults who have been hospitalized. South Bay opened its first Early Intervention program in 1993 to provide educational and developmental services for infants, toddlers and their families. Early Intervention programs in Fall River and Lowell soon followed to meet the growing demand for services. Two years later, a children's therapeutic day activity program was established to divert children from inpatient settings. In 1995, South Bay's Day Services Division was also approved to open a partial hospital program for adults.

• We believe treatment begins with identifying potential and defining strengths.
  
• We believe in providing multidisciplinary treatment with adherence to the highest ethical and professional standards.
  
• We believe in an environment of safety and respect for the value of each individual and the diversity of human experience.
  
• We believe in the timely response to the needs of our consumers and referral agents.
  
• We believe in maximizing resourcefulness to expand services for an ever-changing community.
  
• We believe in cost-effective services and accountability for achieving outcomes.
  
• We believe that all individuals need to achieve self-sufficiency.

At South Bay, promoting and supporting diversity not only enriches our services, but the communities where we live and work and the lives of our consumers and employees. South Bay is dedicated to integrating skills, attitudes and policies to ensure that we are addressing the needs of individuals and families with diverse values, beliefs and sexual orientations, in addition to backgrounds that vary by race, ethnicity, religion, and language.

South Bay's commitment to cultural competency includes: Advisory boards with membership reflective of the populations being served.

• Enrollment and educational materials in different languages, consistent with needs of the populations we serve.
  
• Language support services and translation services.
  
• Standards for recruiting and hiring culturally competent staff.
  
• Treatment modalities that are acceptable and sensitive to language and cultural factors, religious beliefs, and sexual orientation.
  
• A quality monitoring program that evaluates the quality of services and outcomes with respect to culturally diverse populations.
  
• Regular cultural competency trainings.