Substance use is a growing problem across populations. As a helping professional, you need a basic understanding of how substance use affects your clients. This information will help you to provide support and resources to help clients seek treatment and recovery. In this course, you will explore substance use disorders, how they develop, and their impact on individuals. The course also explains your role as a paraprofessional when working with individuals with substance use disorders. You will be provided an overview of evidence-based interventions and the types of substance use treatment programs available, when additional treatment may be necessary. Detailed examples will help you to apply this information in your own work. The goal of this course is to provide paraprofessionals and peer support specialists in health and human service settings with information on substance use disorders and evidence-based interventions.

HIPAA rules underlie every service related to behavioral health, and they change to meet evolving trends. There are potentially catastrophic organizational and individual consequences if the current HIPAA rules are not followed. This course will help you to identify potential legal and ethical issues related to HIPAA, improve your compliance approach, and develop more effective risk management strategies.

The goal of this course is to assist alcohol and drug counselors, marriage and family therapists, professional counselors, psychologists, social workers, and nurses in health and human services settings in understanding and applying current HIPAA regulations.

In this course, you will learn about Motivational Interviewing, an intervention to help people discover their own desire and ability to make difficult changes. Motivational Interviewing (MI) is a way of communicating that draws out people’s own thoughts and beliefs in order to help them address their ambivalence about making a change.

The course uses a blend of instructive information and interactive exercises to help you understand and apply its core concepts. The goal of this course is to provide addictions, behavioral health counseling, marriage and family therapy, nursing, psychology, and social work professionals in health and human service settings with the skills to define and demonstrate the core concepts of Motivational Interviewing.

This is an exciting time to work in the field of behavioral health treatment. The field has changed dramatically in the direction of operating on the principles of recovery. Recovery treatment involves changing our attitudes and beliefs about serious mental illness and the long-term effects of these illnesses over the lifespan to reflect the belief that recovery is the expected outcome. The field continues to expand into areas of advancing the integration of mental health to physical health, connecting to multiple dimensions of wellness and alternative medicine, as well as incorporation of peer recovery specialists. Each of these areas supports the recovery of persons with behavioral health issues.

Addictive disorders were once seen mainly as medical issues. However, this view overlooked other important factors. The biopsychosocial model offers a more complete perspective by considering biological, social, and psychological aspects. This course will explain the main ideas of this model, how it differs from other views, and how it can help treat addictive disorders. 

Obesity rates in the U.S. have risen to the level of an epidemic, as 1 in 3 adults are affected by this disease. Obesity is a disease that significantly affects a person’s health and is not simply due to poor diet and lack of exercise. This course introduces healthcare professionals to the causes, management, and treatment options for adult obesity.

The goal of this course is to familiarize healthcare professionals with the growing epidemic of obesity among adults in the U.S.

Septic arthritis is caused by infection and inflammation in the joint and can result in significant damage to the joints. Early recognition and treatment are critical to the preservation of joint function. This course will discuss how to quickly identify and treat septic arthritis.  

The goal of this course is to provide physicians, nursing professionals, and radiologic technologists with information about septic arthritis.

In the operating room, patient safety depends on high quality communication and shared knowledge among the surgical team. Several factors in this setting can contribute to communication failures like time constraints, shift changes, environmental barriers, the complex nature of surgical procedures, and clashing communication styles. All members of the surgical team must understand the risks to patient safety associated with communication failures, what information must be communicated and when, and how to use an assertive communication style.

The goal of this course is to equip nurses and CSTs with best practices for effectively communicating in the operating room. 

The OR is a complex environment. Highly trained individuals interact in a specialized setting with sophisticated and technically complicated devices, instruments, and equipment. There are also substantial differences among team members related to education, experience, skill level, influence, and formal and informal power. This course will inform nurses and surgical technologists of the evidence-based steps to take to create a culture of safety in the OR.

Proper surgical specimen handling is essential for patient safety. This course covers best practices for intraoperative personnel to prepare, label, and transfer specimens accurately. Adhering to these protocols ensures that specimens are identified and handled appropriately, minimizing the risk of harm to the patient.

This course provides OR nurses and surgical technologists with knowledge of best practices for specimen handling.

Malignant hyperthermia (MH) is a life-threatening syndrome associated with an anesthetic trigger. Awareness of MH by all perioperative team members, from those working in the preoperative holding area to those in the Post Anesthesia Care Unit (PACU), is important in preventing negative patient outcomes.

This course explains the concept of a professional therapeutic boundary and how it differs from a personal relationship. You will learn about the ethical role of the clinical practitioner in establishing appropriate roles and boundaries, the difference between boundary crossings and boundary violations, how to appropriately use social media and other technology, and how to recognize situations with high potential for harmful boundary violations. As you master these skills, you will become more effective in maintaining an appropriate relationship between you and your clients.

You will learn about the costs, benefits, and goals of integrated care systems. As there are numerous challenges to integrating care, you will become aware of some of these key challenges, and familiar with particular characteristics of well-functioning integrated care systems. Finally, you will learn a variety of ways that behavioral healthcare professionals, including you, can function effectively in an integrated care environment.

Mechanical ventilation is a cornerstone of critical care, offering life-saving therapy for patients experiencing respiratory failure for many disease processes. Before 2020, it was estimated that over 300,000 patients receive mechanical ventilation in the U.S. per year (NHSN, 2019). That number is now likely much higher considering the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Although it is a lifesaving intervention, patients who receive mechanical ventilation are at an increased risk for complications, such as ventilator-associated pneumonia, sepsis, volutrauma/barotrauma, acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), and others. These complications may lead to longer ICU and hospital stays, increased risk of disability and death, and increased healthcare costs. For these reasons, clinicians at every level need to understand the concepts, theories, and practices guiding the management of patients receiving mechanical ventilation. 

In this course, you will learn to identify different depressive disorders, as well as the unique ways depression manifests in children and adolescents. Additionally, you will learn to recognize risk factors for both depression and suicidality in youth.  

An integrated care model treats the whole child by combining primary care and mental healthcare in one setting. Within this model, treatment providers understand how to screen for depression and suicidality in order to coordinate care. You will learn about specific instruments useful for detecting depression and suicidality among youth. An understanding of the root causes of depression will highlight the rationale for various treatment approaches. Lastly, you will be able to describe the best practices available to help children and adolescents manage depression.  

Anesthesia administration has become increasingly safer, but is not without risk. Patient- and family-centered care and the desire to save costs has led to a shift in perioperative care needs from “stabilize and admit” to “stabilize and discharge.” Each patient undergoing anesthesia requires competent, professional nursing staff to assist in timely and safe medication administration, maintenance, and recovery. Knowledge of anesthetic techniques, agents, and adjuvants is vital to this competence.

This course focuses specifically on early interventions that are designed to reduce suicide risk. You will learn how these early interventions impact suicide risk. You will also learn of examples and the role that programs highlighting connectedness, life skills, and resilience play in preventing suicide. The goal of this course is to provide social work, psychology, nursing, alcohol and drug counseling, marriage and family therapy, and counseling professionals in health and human services with information about community-based, upstream suicide prevention approaches. 

This course will provide you with information about the numerous risk and protective factors of suicide. You will learn effective screening approaches you can use to identify elevated risk. You will also learn how to follow a positive screening with an in-depth clinical assessment, including several different models you can use to guide your assessment. The goal of this course is to provide alcohol and drug counseling, marriage and family therapy, counseling, psychology, and social work professionals in health and human services with skills to identify individuals at increased risk of suicide.

The perioperative nurse plays a primary role in the anesthesia experience. Knowledge of techniques, patient assessment, and care management for the patient receiving or recovering from anesthesia positively impacts patient outcomes. This course discusses anesthetics and adjuvant medications used in the perioperative setting, anesthesia-related complications, and the nurse’s role in assisting with anesthesia management.

This course provides nursing professionals with information about the principles and practices of anesthesia care in the perioperative setting.

Perioperative providers can BEST prepare for emergencies in the operating room by knowing the responsibilities of each team member and rehearsing interventions ahead of time. When you are in the moment and your heart is racing, it’s easy to forget how to respond or even where supplies are located. Practicing your responsibilities and team interventions ahead of time will help to prepare you for the unexpected. This course provides you with an opportunity to participate in five emergency scenarios to test your knowledge. Time is of the essence when an emergency happens so you must think and act fast to save the patient!

The goal of this course is to equip nurses and STs with knowledge of the responsibilities of the team during a range of OR emergencies.