Presenters and slide deck
Miriam McLaughlin, Mental Health Clinician - Stella’s Place
Jennille Seedial - Youth Peer Mentor Coordinator, Stella’s Place
Key Learnings
- Stella’s Place has integrated a peer support modality in the delivery of Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), resulting in an integrated peer-clinician approach to serving young adults between the ages of 16-29 in a community mental health setting. They have also adapted the integration of young adult feedback into its delivery.
- Stella’s Place’s successful adaptation addresses gaps in literature and provides preliminary evidence to support this approach.
- Evaluation findings indicate that individuals enrolled in the program experienced:
- Significant decreases in their use of harmful coping skills.
- Significant increases in their use of effective coping skills.
- Significant increases in participants’ self-efficacy and resiliency scores.
- Higher retention rates (87%) than those reported from comparable DBT groups that do not integrate a peer support modality in community settings (42-76%).
Identified Gaps in Research, Practice, and/or Policy
Additional research is needed to further explore the effectiveness of adaptations to DBT program delivery in meeting the needs of youth with complex presentations in a community-based setting.
Contact Email of Presenters
Miriam McLaughlin - mmclaughlin@stellasplace.ca
Jennille Seedial - jseedial@stellasplace.ca
