HOLY ROSARY PRESCHOOL FIELD TRIP

JOHNSONBURG – Holy Rosary Preschool visited the DMHC Parents as Teacher’s Children’s Center for a field trip. The PAT Children’s Center is a facility under Dickinson Mental Health Center’s Children’s Prevention Services that is open to the general public for children ages birth to five, where children have a unique opportunity to engage in a quality learning environment.

The Children’s Center is a learning environment for young children and their families. Parent-Child Groups, Parent Groups along with an opportunity to play and socialize are some of the services offered.  Parenting and educational resources are available to be used at the center or borrowed for use at home.  The learning environment, designed in conjunction with Community Playthings, offers an outstanding array of hands-on learning activities.  The Parents as Teachers staff is available to assist families and provide suggestions for fun developmentally appropriate acitivities.

If you are a parent struggling to find the right toys for your children, stop in at the Children’s Center at the Community Education Council on 4 Erie Avenue in St. Marys. The Center’s hours are: Tuesday and Thursday 10am-7pm and Wednesday and Friday 9am-2pm.  Lynn Floravit, the Children’s Center facilitator also offers playgroups every Friday starting at 10:00am.

DMHC Parents as Teachers reminds parents that children learn through play. Children not only love to play they need to play. It looks fun, and it should be.  It is important to realize that although your child’s play may seem loud, messy and even nonproductive, they are learning about themselves and their world.

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2/24/10

February is Dental Health Month

Elk County –Alyssa Schlimm, Dental Hygienist with Dr. Joseph Hawkins Dental Office, visited the DMHC Parents as Teacher Children’s Center educating children about the importance of dental health. This educational presentation was offered during the Parents as Teachers weekly 10:30am Friday playgroup. The children learned how important it is to brush and floss their teeth along with maintaining a healthy diet. Alyssa promoted guidelines as per American Dental Association (www.ada.org)

The American Dental Association recommends that a child be seen by a dentist as soon as his or her first tooth erupts, but at least no later than the first birthday.  A dental visit at an early age is a “well baby checkup” for the teeth.

 Begin brushing your child’s teeth with a little water as soon as the first tooth appears.  If you are considering using toothpaste before the child is two years of age, ask your dentist or physician first. Supervise tooth brushing to make sure children older than two years of age use only a pea-size amount of fluoride toothpaste and avoid swallowing it. Children should be taught to spit out remaining toothpaste and rinse with water after brushing.   Most children will be able to brush on their own by the age of six or seven years.  Parents should be using floss or an interdental cleaner on their children’s teeth as soon as any two teeth touch.  Cleaning between the teeth is important because it removes plaque where a toothbrush cannot reach.  Brush your child’s teeth twice a day unless your dentist recommends otherwise.

Help your children maintain a lifelong healthy smile by providing them with a well-balanced diet, limiting snacks, ensuring that they brush twice a day and floss once per day, and scheduling regular dental checkups for them.

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2/19/10

Linda White, Dickinson's Autism director, gave a heartfelt speech during the ceremony, highlighting the services the organization will be able to provide for children in the region with autism.

"We are a program that is going to support the needs of families with children with autism in our rural communities," White said. "What we want to offer is a comprehensive diagnosis, we want to offer a coordination of services and we want to provide treatment services to families."

White then read an emotional statement from Frank Klein describing the barriers an autistic child's brain faces in development and how licensed professionals should work to overcome those developmental barriers.

White discussed how Dickinson's program blazes a local path to the treatment of autism.

"This program is going to offer something to this area they have never had before – a place to have a diagnosis done, a coordination of services that has just been unheard of in the past," White said. "This is a very, very exciting program.

"It has been a really big project, and it is not over. We have many things to accomplish yet."

White spoke of the efforts of John Yates and current Dickinson CEO Jack Goga put into getting the program off the ground.

"I say thank you to John Yates," White said. "He is the one that passed on to us, as an agency, his vision for a program that would meet the needs of individuals learning with autism. That is where it started. Then, the ball went to Jack Goga. He cut that path. His weekend job was to develop a service model that would meet the needs of children with autism. He has put in a lot of hours doing that."

For Goga, the ribbon-cutting ceremony was the fruition of a dream.

"This is a celebration," Goga said. "As Linda pointed out, this project has been a long time in the making. I think when you look around the room today you can really sense the anticipation, the pride, the hard work and the inspiration of the dream that went into making this a reality."

The development of Possibilities was not an easy task, according to Goga.

"We certainly had our formidable challenges along the way to get to this point today," Goga said. "There was a lot of effort invested with getting the Office of Mental Health and Substance Abuse on board with this given our rural location and the resources that we had to begin such an undertaking. Most recently, a successfully completed review by the Bureau of Autism, itself, which we just learned recently has sanctioned the program here as a bona fide autism center for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. We've come through all those litmus tests and we have come out the other side, I think, very well-prepared to take on this challenge."
 

Possibilities brings the diagnostics and treatments of autism to a local level.

"One of the things we all know, living in the community we are living in here, and being a provider in northwestern Pennsylvania, is that access to services are very difficult for many people," Goga said. "It is not because they don't want to be involved in care. It is a matter of the fact they simply can't find the vehicle by which to actually get to locations for services that are desperately needed."
In the past, parents have had to travel great distances to have their child diagnosed and treated. Now, parents won't have to travel quite as far, according to Goga.

"We believe this is the start of something very, very special here," Goga said. "I think we have assembled a group of individuals who I think are spectacular individuals and they come well-equipped in terms of their professional skill set. I think they are going to rival any services that they would have received at Geisinger of UPMC location.

"This very valuable and needed service is community-based and is here and we're going to make the most of that opportunity to fulfill the rest of the dream and the possibilities."

Dickinson received a grant from Milestone Behavioral Health to cover the costs of the sensory integration equipment, according to Goga.

Victoria Livingston of Milestone Behavioral Health read Goga's presentation on the Internet and immediately wanted to help.
"I read his proposal on the Internet, and be careful what you write because sometimes it does come true," Livingston said. "I read his proposal and I was interested in making that happen.

"It is about the children. My nephew, Nikko, struggles with this particular disability. What I tell him every day, even superheroes need help sometimes. We do it for the children. We are more than grateful to help support these programs. This is why we go to work."
 

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2/8/10
 

DMHC Looking to Expand Lifesharing Service

Lifesharing is when an individual with intellectual disabilities lives with an unrelated person(s) or family. It means living and sharing life’s experiences together, creating a caring household environment. It is both a close personal relationship and a place to live. Individuals in Lifesharing have a wide array of needs ranging from daily, hands-on support to having a lot of independence and minimal supervision. The ultimate goal is to provide a supportive, secure, and loving home.

Each person receiving lifesharing services is given many opportunities to participate in community activities, make choices in their daily lives, develop and maintain personal relationships and having the opportunity to grow.  Each individual is encouraged to be independent as possible.  Supervision plans and program goal plans are tailored to the capabilities of each person, are put in place to assist an individual with improving their skills, and, are always carried out with safety in mind.  Qualified professionals help the Lifesharer and family adjust and to meet personal objectives. An individual’s total well-being is uppermost in all lifesharing homes.