In This Issue

Welcome to the latest edition of CMHIS Community Connect, your every-other-month source for tools, insights, and opportunities to strengthen mental health practices.

During Suicide Prevention Awareness Month, we recognize that suicide prevention is not confined to one moment or one person. It is strengthened through the relationships we build, the support we offer, and the communities we create together.

In this issue:

• See implementation in action: Explore our new Implementation Project Profiles and learn how organizations are working with CMHIS to strengthen mental health services and sustain improvements.
• Center lived experience: Discover a new toolkit for building meaningful partnerships throughout the implementation process with people who have lived experience.
• Connect with CMHIS: Meet members of our team at the 2026 National Association for Rural Mental Health Conference in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
• Build practical skills: Explore upcoming regional learning opportunities focused on strengthening internal communication and balancing fidelity with flexibility when implementing effective practices.
• Hear from the Pacific West Hub: Learn about shared priorities identified by behavioral health leaders from across HHS Regions 9 and 10.
• Explore the latest national findings: Review key results from the 2025 National Survey on Drug Use and Health and consider what they mean for your community, organization, or system.
• Strengthen your implementation knowledge: Watch eight short videos covering essential topics for implementing and sustaining effective mental health practices.

Each issue brings practical examples and timely resources to support your work. As always, CMHIS is here to support a connected community advancing accessible, effective mental health care.

Introduction

Dear colleagues,

Across the country, organizations are working to strengthen mental health services, respond to changing needs, and build systems and supports to succeed. CMHIS works alongside these organizations to help them address implementation challenges and make meaningful, sustainable improvements.

We are excited to introduce our new Implementation Project Profiles to highlight this work and the people and partnerships behind it.

Each profile takes you inside a CMHIS collaboration to explore the challenge an organization was addressing, the implementation support provided, important insights and turning points, what changed and has endured, and lessons for others facing similar challenges.

From strengthening referral pathways to building organizational capacity and improving how teams use data, these stories offer practical examples of how implementation support can help organizations make effective mental health services work better and last.

We invite you to explore the Implementation Project Profiles and discover ideas that may support your own work.

Resource Spotlight

Turn Lived Experience Into Meaningful Partnership



Meaningfully engaging people with lived experience can help mental health organizations design and strengthen services that better reflect the needs, priorities, and realities of the communities they serve. Authentic engagement requires more than asking for feedback; it takes intentional planning, shared influence, trust, and the right supports.

Developed by the Northeast Atlantic and Caribbean Hub, Powering Implementation Through Lived Experience Engagement: A Toolkit for Providers and Administrators offers practical guidance for incorporating lived experience throughout the implementation of mental health programs and initiatives.

Users will find practical strategies for some of the most important elements of meaningful engagement, including:

• Building trust and recognizing signs of tokenism
• Identifying and supporting the right people to participate
• Creating accessible and welcoming opportunities for engagement
• Closing the feedback loop so participants understand how their input was used
• Planning for staffing, resources, incentives, and fair compensation

Whether your organization is beginning to engage people with lived experience or looking to strengthen existing practices, the toolkit provides a practical starting point for building more authentic partnerships and incorporating lived expertise into implementation decisions.

From the Field

CMHIS to Exhibit at 2026 NARMH Conference

Connect with Ricardo Canelo, CMHIS director of operations, and Annie Lenoir, Southwestern Plains Hub evaluator, as they exhibit on behalf of CMHIS at the 2026 National Association for Rural Mental Health (NARMH) Conference. The conference will feature speakers and workshops focused on rural policy, clinical practice, and effective leadership, as well as resilient strategies and innovative solutions that communities have employed over the past several years.

Stop by Sept. 28–29 at the Eldorado Hotel & Spa in Santa Fe, New Mexico, to learn more about CMHIS and our bi-regional Hubs and how we can support your work with rural communities.

Regional Learning Opportunities

At CMHIS, all of our learning opportunities and resources are free.

Improving Internal Communications in Mental Health Service Teams

Thursday, Sept. 17, 2026

9–10:30 a.m. PT, 10–11:30 a.m. MT, 11 a.m.–12:30 p.m. CT, and noon–1:30 p.m. ET

This event is open to individuals working in HHS Regions 3 and 4 (AL, DE, DC, FL, GA, KY, MD, MS, NC, PA, SC, TN, VA, WV).

Join the East Coast Hub for a regional learning session designed to provide mental health service teams with practical tools and strategies for strengthening internal communication. Participants will explore communication best practices, learn how to develop and implement an internal communication plan, and identify approaches to improve communication across teams and projects. This training is intended to support successful implementation efforts by enhancing how team members communicate, collaborate, and stay informed.

Fidelity, Not Formula: Balancing Treatment Integrity and Flexibility in EBP Implementation (Learning Community)

Apply by Friday, Sept. 25, 2026. 

This event is open to individuals working in HHS Regions 1 and 2 (ME, NH, VT, MA, CT, RI, NY, NJ, PR, USVI).

The Northeast Atlantic and Caribbean Hub is pleased to offer a structured learning community for organizational leaders and clinical supervisors focused on understanding, measuring, and sustainably integrating evidence-based practice (EBP) fidelity into organizational workflows. When implementing EBPs, organizations often struggle to balance model compliance with real-world clinical realities. This initiative moves beyond rigid compliance to help leaders build data-driven systems that respect model integrity, clinical workflows, and center client needs.

Participants will engage in a series of collective workshops with individualized consultation for up to five organizations, from Oct. 2, 2026, through Jan. 15, 2027.

Hub Spotlight

Pacific West Leaders Identify Priorities for the Year Ahead

In July, the Pacific West Hub brought together behavioral health leaders and partners from across HHS Regions 9 and 10, including Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Alaska, Arizona, and Hawaii, for a full-day bi-regional convening in Seattle. Participants shared experiences, identified common challenges, and explored opportunities for collaboration.

While communities across the region face different local contexts, several shared priorities emerged from the conversation:

• Strengthening rural behavioral health systems
• Supporting tribal behavioral health capacity and sovereignty
• Moving beyond compliance toward improved quality of care
• Fostering healthier organizational data cultures
• Responding to ongoing challenges, including workforce pressures, geographic barriers, wildfires, extreme weather, and other disruptions

As we enter Year 3 of the CMHIS grant, these priorities will help inform the Pacific West Hub’s continued work with behavioral health organizations and partners across the bi-region. The Hub will build on the ideas, relationships, and shared learning from the convening to support practical solutions tailored to local needs.

News From Our Partners

New 2025 NSDUH Results Offer a Snapshot of Mental Health in the U.S.

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) has released the 2025 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) results, providing a new national snapshot of mental health, substance use, treatment access, and recovery across the United States.

This year’s findings highlight both encouraging progress and persistent challenges. Adolescent depression and suicidal thoughts and behaviors declined compared with 2021, and a growing share of adults who have experienced a mental health issue consider themselves in recovery. At the same time, significant gaps in access to treatment remain for both adults and adolescents, and suicide plans and attempts among adults increased.

CMHIS has highlighted four findings from the new NSDUH results and paired each with practical implementation questions and resources that can help organizations respond.

Explore the 2025 NSDUH results and consider what the findings mean for your community, organization, or system.

• Read the full 2025 NSDUH results.
• Browse the full CMHIS Resource Library for tools to support you with taking action.
• Explore the Learning Lab for self-paced online courses and recorded learning sessions.
• Request support if you are already working through one of these problems and want a thought partner.

We would love to hear from you! Is there something you want us to cover in an upcoming CMHIS newsletter? Send us your thoughts, stories, or feedback.

What to Expect Next Month

In October, you will receive the newsletter from your local Hub, with updates and highlights from your bi-region.

We will be back in November with more CMHIS news, stories, and insights. In the meantime, feel free to visit our website, send us an email, or follow us on LinkedIn.

Request Support

The Center for Mental Health Implementation Support (CMHIS) and our bi-regional Hubs offer assistance to grantees funded by SAMHSA’s Center for Mental Health Services and any organizations that oversee or directly provide mental health services. We can help your organization or system improve the delivery of mental health care by supporting you in preparing for, implementing, and sustaining effective prevention, treatment, and recovery programs and services.



Please review our guidelines and submit a request.

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This work was supported by cooperative agreement H79SM090078 from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of SAMHSA/HHS.