CMHA NDIS and Mental Health Conference
The fourth NDIS and Mental Health Conference will be held at the International Convention Centre Sydney on the 20th and 21st of February 2023. The NDIS needs to realise its potential as an investment in recovery, capacity building and wellbeing. We look forward to having you a part of this great discussion.
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Our 2021 CMHA 3rd National NDIS and Mental Health Conference was held online.
Assisting Communities through Direct Connection (ACDC)
The ACDC project is a new initiative to inform and connect people with the social and emotional wellbeing support services available to them. The project takes an exploratory and highly proactive approach to reaching out and connecting directly with people in their homes to:
(a) provide targeted information about local and online mental health and wellbeing servicesÂ
(b) to understand their mental health and social determinant needs and concerns
(c) to where possible connect them with relevant support and servicesÂ
The project is funded by the Information, Linkages and Capacity Building (ILC) grant scheme of the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA). The project aims to reach people with social or emotional distress, especially those who belong to marginalised communities including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (ATSI) communities, Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CALD) communities, LGBTQI+ communities, and rural and remote communities.Â
The project is being co-produced with people who have a lived experience of social or emotional distress, carers, local community members, local services and state and territory peak organisations. The project will use a combination of best practice approaches including responsible door-to-door outreach and informed, community sensitive engagement. The outreach will be undertaken by ‘People Connectors’ engaged by CMOs contracted by CMHA. The People Connectors will complete a robust and co-designed education and training program which will be developed by the ACDC project team.
The project is being rollout out in 24 sites from selected communities from all Australian states and territories; and at each site is being preceded by an extensive engagement with stakeholders for consultation, co-design, and preparation. The engagement process is being led the ACDC Steering Committee. CMHA has commissioned the Centre for Social Impact to undertake the research to measure project learnings and outcomes and provide an evaluation and continuous improvement process to continue to inform the project activity.