How one Beaufort health center is helping depressed people get out of bed

After Melissa Collard separated from her husband and was let go from her job of 14 years she felt like her world was turned upside down.

“My life had totally fallen apart,” Collard said. “There were days for a couple weeks where I couldn’t get out of bed. I couldn’t even brush my teeth.”

Shortly after being let go, Collard, who lives in Beaufort, started a new job as a finance manager, but she found herself falling apart again.

“I couldn’t get past losing my job at the propane company,” Collard said. “I had made it my lifelong career, and it didn’t turn out to be that.”

Overcome with pain and debilitating emotions, she decided to get help for her depression.

“I started crying, shaking, losing control of everything,” Collard said. “I was trying to hide in the wall, you know, just trying to sink into it.”

In November 2016, Collard began meeting with a counselor at Coastal Empire Mental Health Center in Beaufort and after being unemployed for a few months, she found a new job through the Individualized Placement Support program at Coastal Empire.

Years of research have demonstrated programs like this to be more effective in helping people with mental illness obtain employment than any other program, which is why it is called an evidence-based practice in community psychiatry.

With the help of a grant from the South Carolina Department of Mental Health, Coastal Empire began providing the specialized employment service to people enrolled in treatment in January at its Beaufort clinic.

“We see their work as a part of their recovery and mental health treatment,” said Bob Medzie, IPS coordinator for Coastal Empire. “Having a job and working really helps a person with their recovery. It’s just like seeing a doctor or taking medications.”

South Carolina was one of the first states used to develop research for the IPS practice in the ’90s, and it grew statewide from there.

The new site in Beaufort is one of 10 community mental health facilities across the state offering the program to help people living with behavioral health conditions work at regular jobs of their choosing.

In 2016, the state’s IPS programs had 255 new job placements and had an employment rate of 62 percent. Employment rates of most programs that serve people with mental health disabilities employment are around 20 percent, according to Demetrius Henderson, director of client employment and recovery services at the South Carolina Department of Mental Health.

Once a person indicates they want to work, employment specialists start with the person’s preferences and abilities and then try to find employers hiring for that preference. The specialists coordinate plans with a person’s treatment team, employers and other community providers such as Vocational Rehabilitation Services.

No one is excluded because they are not “ready” or because of prior work history, hospitalization history, substance use, symptoms or other characteristics.

“We systematically contact employers who hire for that kind of work, we explain hiring incentives, the program and ensure we work with the person until well after they’re hired,” Medzie said.

Coastal Empire had one part-time employment specialist since 2000, but with the IPS program in motion, there will be two full-time employment specialists.

“That will allow us to do a lot more development of job opportunities for people we’re serving,” Medzie said.

Coastal Empire receives help from collaboration with Vocational Rehabilitation Services of South Carolina and community partners, such as the National Alliance of Mental Illness of Low County and Beaufort County Council.

Since January, six people have been hired through the program, according to Medzie.

Coast Empire’s immediate goal is to keep 20 employed, or 50 percent of the maximum participants.

“It’s a pretty high standard and something that’s not easy to accomplish,” Medzie said. “But it’s a goal, and we’re committed.”

A little more than two months into her job at the Marine Corp Air Station Beaufort Mess Hall, Collard has already been promoted from a food service employee to a supervisor.

She has also gone from seeing her counselor once a week to twice a month and hasn’t had any fall backs since starting her new job, she said.

“I’ve gone from semi-scattered to completely lost to all put together,” Collard said.

This story was originally published May 9, 2017 at 4:12 PM with the headline "How one Beaufort health center is helping depressed people get out of bed."