Imagine You Disaster Wellness Training

Recently we trained an amazing group of American Red Cross staff and volunteers. These second responders are all still feeling the after effects of the Kincade fire, the mass evacuation of our county, and the frequent power shutdowns. We provided interactive presentations, self-care strategies, and personal resilience tools to deploy when working with disaster survivors in response and recovery. Overall 84% of participants rated the training good, very good, or excellent.

Here are some of the comments from the training participants:

• “What matters most” intriguing concept for helping a client to remember who they are and to connect their actions to something bigger in themselves.

• “Using the Interrupting tool when someone is sharing an upsetting story that has been told before – I now feel I can break in and help them take a breath to make the conversation calmer and potentially more productive!”

• “The What matters most” is an intriguing concept for helping a client or colleague remember who they are and to connect their actions to something bigger in themselves.”

• “I will use the breathing technique for myself and I might use it pretty often in casework, I’ll look for applications. Am interested in try the tools we learned in my next event. “

This 1-day Disaster Wellness Training was supported by the American Red Cross. For more information about offering our trainings to your staff or community group, please contact Cynthia Calmenson or Dr. Barnett.

Imagine You and the Disaster Cycle

Imagine You® is a training resource for disaster response, recovery, and preparedness. Since 2010 Imagine You® has trained a wide variety of organizations in Northern California, providing tools and skills that help individuals move toward living their best lives.

IMAGINE YOU® TRAINING OFFERS SKILLS THAT HELP:

• Early rapport with clients to help them prioritize.

• Reduce stress in all phases of the disaster cycle.

• Increase self-care capacity for service providers.

• Strengthen the disaster cycle infrastructure in the North Bay.

Second responders, disaster support staff, volunteers, social services providers, lay ministers, and healthcare staff are using Imagine You® to support and enhance their work and their own self-care. Funders of Imagine You trainings include: American Red Cross, Alliance Medical Center, CAP Sonoma, Catholic Charities of California, Catholic Charities of Santa Rosa, Child Parent Institute, and the Community foundation of Mendocino County.

GOALS AND OUTCOMES OF THE IMAGINE YOU® METHOD:

• Early rapport with clients to help them prioritize.

• Reduced stress in all phases of the disaster cycle.

• Increased self-care capacity for service providers.

• Stronger disaster cycle infrastructure in the North Bay

WHO WE HAVE WORKED WITH:

• Second responders across all sectors

• Disaster support staff

• Volunteers

• Social services providers

• Lay Ministers

• Healthcare staff

CLIENTS AND FUNDERS INCLUDE:

• American Red Cross

• Alliance Medical Center

• CAP Sonoma

• Catholic Charities of California

• Catholic Charities of Santa Rosa

• Child Parent Institute

• Community Foundation Mendocino County

FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:

• Cynthia Calmenson, Executive Director – email, or call 707-623-0151

• Ellen Barnett, MD, PhD, Director of Outreach and Program Development – email

Imagine You Cross-Cultural Facilitator

When Dr. Sumedha Khanna, an OB GYN physician, was still practicing medicine, she valued having a conversation with her patients and getting to know them. When she retired, she was lucky enough to find a physician who would do the same for her. Her physician’s considerate care eventually influenced her approach to daily living and also affected her consulting work with senior women at her women’s health center, Healing Well, and with her senior women’s group, “Sisters of the Third Journey.”

Her physician was Dr. Ellen Barnett, founder of Imagine YOU, a healthcare approach that places focus on patients and their goals. Khanna said, “Even though I’m not a practicing physician anymore, I’m always interested in physicians who talk to their patients before checking vital signs….. I was very moved that somebody [Dr. Barnett] was interested in how a person feels and what matters to them rather than imposing a number of tests before talking to them.”

Khanna’s positive experiences with Barnett and Imagine YOU piqued her interest. Imagine YOU resembled the patient-centered care (PCC) she had practiced during her medical career, but it’s focused and involved process was intriguing.

Although PCC and the more traditional care approach both value the patient and their health, PCC differs in emphasizing open patient-physician communication. Health discussions are not limited to a diagnosis and treatment. Instead, they are more personal, in which a patient’s lifestyle, preferences, and goals are discussed. This way, patients can take a more active role in their health care, in collaboration with a health professional.

Imagine YOU expands on this idea of PCC by focusing on the whole person and on what drives them to take action to improve their circumstances. Instead of being told what’s best for their health, people pinpoint what they think is best for their well being and use this as motivation to take small steps to improve their health. For example, instead of simply being told to be more physically active, a person imagines enjoying hikes with a friend. This person can then take comfortable steps toward that goal, perhaps by enjoying short walks after work a few days a week. S/he can gradually work up to longer walks in various terrains. Imagine YOU offers participants a practice they can commit to.

Imagine YOU helps provides a fresh, healthy outlook on any situation. Khanna said, “I use this method for myself, and it works. Changes happen in people’s lives, and we have to think of what’s important to us and how to achieve it, so we can get through this change.”

There isn’t a foolproof approach to making big changes, like deciding where to live, but Khanna describes how Imagine YOU helped guide her with where to begin. She said, “I had to imagine what kind of place I wanted to live in, and what kind of a house…I created a visual for myself about what I see in this place, and that gave me the idea of moving to where I am now.”

Today, Khanna lives in Santa Rosa, California, and keeps herself busy. One of her projects, “Sisters of the Third Journey,” is a group made up of women 60 years and older. They meet regularly to find ways to take care of their health and be empowered to remain driven, happy, and active as they grow older.

“I used Imagine You in a couple of our group meetings. I think it’s a good way to help women as they face challenges. For example, something common is that someone’s husband gets weak so the wife gets concerned about him, and about losing him. Imagine YOU would be a good way for the wives to focus on themselves and figure out what’s important to them, so they can move forward.”

Moving forward could be as simple as making it through the stress of the day. A woman caring for her sick husband is bound to face difficult and stressful situations, but even in the midst of that, Imagine YOU could help her feel better and more positive. It could make this challenge somewhat bearable because it provides an image of hope and something to look forward to. Imagine YOU helps people realize what matters to them and imagine positive outcomes and possibilities outside their current situation. This motivates them to work towards those possibilities.

As a financial supporter of IMCF projects, Khanna learned the Imagine YOU methodology by observing training sessions and workshops. She said, “It seems to work well under group settings. But I’d like to try to use Imagine You in a one on one setting when interacting with seniors, in a new group I’m starting called “Aging Well.” It would allow more focus on each person.”

She adds, “I’m interested in how this method translates to people of different cultures and languages.”  Khanna is originally from India, and one of her second languages is Spanish. During her time with the World Health Organization, she’s done public health work in over 60 countries. This background, no doubt, provided insight on the complexities of cultural differences and communication.

“English is a very precise language. Other languages like Spanish or Hindi are not.” Laughing, she adds, “You can’t just ask questions like ‘what matters to you,’ or ‘how do you imagine yourself,’ and expect understanding. It requires deeper explanation and establishing a comfortable baseline in working with a person from different background. Imagine YOU seems to be working well with Spanish communities, in that sense. I’d like to figure out how to apply this method with other cultures, languages and places, like India.” Though she hasn’t achieved that particular goal yet, she may get closer once she begins applying Imagine YOU to her one on one consulting work.

During her career as a physician, Khanna worked with people from a variety of background and demographics. Now retired, she is constantly looking for new ways to work with people, like senior women, to help them live purposefully. Imagine YOU is one such method.

Claudia Levia: Imagine You Trainer

More than 30 years ago, a teenaged Claudia Leiva and her family moved to the United States from El Salvador. While this move to a completely new country was a difficult adjustment, it helped shape her constant awareness of people’s backgrounds and cultural differences. It showed her that effectively reaching out to someone relies on acknowledging and embracing these differences.

This comes naturally to Leiva in her work as an Imagine YOU workshop leader. Imagine YOU workshops encourage participants to be involved in improving their health by digging beneath a medical diagnosis and corresponding treatment. It pushes participants to focus on what matters to them. Instead of being told what to do for their health, they’re inspired by their own personal motivations, which makes it easier to achieve their goals.

Leiva said, “Everybody has different goals. The workshops help participants think of health in broader ways, so [learning new behaviors] can go far beyond just diet and exercise. It’s very empowering, because each individual learns that the answers and solutions they’re looking for are within them.”

Imagine YOU workshops are geared towards various demographics within a community. There are workshops for seniors, for young students, and in Leiva’s case, the adult, Spanish-speaking population within Sonoma County. In the three years since she began working with the program, Leiva has been striving to achieve one of the organization’s goals of being culturally relevant and available to members of different communities.

However, cultural relevance is not limited to overcoming language barriers, like Spanish. In 2018 and again in 2019 Leiva and another instructor brought ten Imagine YOU workshops to the Avance (Spanish for “advance”) program in Sonoma County.

She said, “Most of the participants are females, mothers and immigrants. Sometimes, maybe one or two men attend, but rarely. The women’s experiences and goals are centered on being mothers. A lot of them are very family oriented, so when they make their health goals, it’s usually related to spending quality family time over weekends, when they’re not working. When I’m leading the workshops, I just need to be aware of who the participants are, what they need, and support and embrace it. ”

Leiva also notes the strength of Imagine YOU comes from the ease with which workshop participants can achieve their goals. She said, “Each goal is doable and personal, so people don’t have to struggle. It may take years for a person to achieve their goal, such as being more involved in dance, but it’s done in small steps, such as slowly taking up dance lessons.”

Aside from her work with Imagine YOU, Leiva is adjunct faculty at the Santa Rosa Junior Colleges and teaches GED preparation courses, and basic reading and writing. For Leiva, teaching has been an exciting and fulfilling work where she can help students achieve their dreams, much like her role in Imagine YOU workshops.

Leiva’s community service work shows that teaching plays a vital role in her life. She explains it’s simply something she grew up with, surrounded by family members who were teachers. But for Leiva, the defining moment came when she was fifteen years old, in El Salvador. She said, “I was part of a youth group that visited foster kids, and provided fun activities for them. I became interested in how they live with adults who are not their parents, and in observing their family unit and environment. Then, in this country, I started out as an elementary school teacher, and realized I enjoyed not just teaching the children, but working with the adults and providing them support so they can be a bigger influence on their children’s lives.”

Leiva’s parents have also been a big influence on her by showing her to put passion into everything she does, constantly maintain professionalism and try to grow as a person and professional. She said, “My parents moved me and my two sisters from El Salvador when I was in my teens. We were forced to leave our country. It was hard, but my parents did it so they can give us a more stable life. Everything they did for us was out of love.”

Her work with Imagine YOU and at the SRJC allows Leiva to follow her parents’ example while providing a service to her community. In workshops and in the classroom, Leiva uses her role as an educator to instill positive messages and help make a difference within the community.

Leiva said, “As an educator and workshop leader, I’m happy to be able to provide support to my students and the workshop groups. And with Imagine YOU, for example, I enjoy that the focus is not really the leader but the person. It’s simple and gets results, because you have the tools to reach your goals, and that’s very empowering.”

By Sarah Speaman, UC Davis

IMCF Receives Red Cross Wildfire Recovery Grant

We are grateful to be recent grant recipients of the American Red Cross 2017 California Wildfires Recovery Program.

Grant funds will be used to provide Imagine You Resilience and Client Navigation Training to 40 California H.O.P.E. Sonoma Crisis Counselors. This Imagine YOU training will provide important and necessary tools that will help fire impacted individuals across Sonoma County and beyond, to move forward in their long and difficult recovery journey.

With our training, and our strong community partnership with the Crisis Counselors, fire impacted individuals are learning to use Imagine YOU to help themselves become more self-sufficient, more resilient, and more able to cope with adverse circumstance that arise during their recovery efforts and challenges.

We are honored to be a resource for the ongoing wildfire recovery efforts in our Sonoma County, and beyond. To find out more about how we are helping the community recover, please contact us directly.

IMCF Awarded Grant to Aid Wildfire Recovery

IMCF Awarded Grant by Community Foundation of Mendocino County to Aid in Community Recovery after the Wildfires.

SANTA ROSA, CA – On January 29, 2019, The Integrative Medical Clinic Foundation (IMCF), a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping individuals achieve their best health and life through their Imagine YOU® program, has received support provided by the Redwood Valley and Santa Rosa Community Recovery Fund, a corporate-advised fund of the Community Foundation of Mendocino County. The fund will support IMCF’s project to help youth and seniors impacted by the Redwood Complex fire.

The grant will allow IMCF to provide Imagine YOU training to 18 staff members from community organizations that work with those affected by the fires, with a focus on the more vulnerable youth and seniors. Many survivors have been displaced from their homes and struggle to move forward. This training will help advance community restoration by guiding community members to ask themselves “What matter most?” as they heal from the damage caused by the fires.

This question, “What matters to you?”, will help individuals set personal goals and plans for themselves as they transition to the next step in their lives. Imagine YOU Training participants ( agency staff) will encourage community members to focus on self-care, and well-being goals, as they explore “What matters” and build resilience in the face of difficult times.

Cynthia Calmenson, Executive Director and Imagine YOU Program Manager at IMCF, said, “Situations like these are dire, but we believe that fire survivors are not victims, but individuals with energy and resources that can be brought to bear to rebuild their own lives. Imagine YOU can help make this happen.”

IMCF will be partnering with community agencies that include Manzanita Services, North Coast Opportunities, and Redwood Community Services for the duration of this project. These agencies provide outreach services and multiple supports to fire survivors in the community.

“We believe that the Imagine YOU training offers an opportunity to bring a best practice support tool to our clients through trained staff that could have a lasting impact on the well being of those affected by the fires,” said Susan Novotny, Executive Director at Manzanita Services. “We are especially excited about the Imagine YOU training because, in contrast to, many other trainings, Imagine You provides our staff with post-training skills reinforcement and implementation support which will greatly impact the consistency and efficacy of utilizing this self care tool with our clients.”

The Imagine YOU Training begins in March and consists of three consecutive segments followed by ongoing skills reinforcement and implementation support meet-ups. It will be led by Dr. Ellen Barnett, MD, PhD, and developer of the Imagine YOU program, Corrine Meadows, LMFT, Imagine YOU Trainer, and Cynthia Calmenson, Executive Director and Imagine YOU Program Manager at IMCF.

The Mendocino Family of Companies, through the Community Foundation of Mendocino County, established the Redwood Valley and Santa Rosa Community Recovery Fund to support community restoration after the devastating October 2017 Nuns, Tubbs, and Redwood Complex fires. The fund distributed close to $800,000 in grants to support community restoration efforts.

Cynthia Calmenson, Executive Director
Integrative Medical Clinic Foundation: Imagine YOU Project
175 Concourse Blvd.
Santa Rosa, CA
707-623-0151 mobile
707-284-9225 voicemail
cynthiac@imcfound.org

Helping with Northbay Wildfire Recovery

Imagine YOU Northbay wildfire recovery efforts launched by grant from the Redwood Credit Union Northbay Fire Fund. In Sonoma County the Redwood Credit Union North Bay Fire Relief Fund recently awarded Imagine YOU a grant that has enabled us to put on a leader training program on April 19 & May 3, 2018 in Santa Rosa.

The Imagine YOU Leader program focusses on resilience training for professional staff from social service, health, and other organizations making a difference in the Northbay. Many use Imagine YOU in Spanish with their mono-lingual clients.

IMAGINE YOU LEADER TRAINING

Our training programs are in big demand. The current program can only hold 12 people, but more than 25 applied. We are currently seeking more funding to host more Imagine YOU trainings in this time of need for our area.

Local leaders engage during the Imagine YOU Leader training.

Press Democrat Feature Article

This past Sunday the Press Democrat wrote an insightful article about Imagine YOU and What Matters. Read the full article below. Click here to read more.

Imagine You in the Latino Community

Recently we received funding from the NorthBay Cancer Alliance to translate the Imagine YOU workshop materials into Spanish. Our Translation Team, Chelene Lopez and Ines Hernandez from St. Joseph Community Benefit, Claudia Leiva from Avance/First 5, and Julie Burns from the The Communications Bridge, are working diligently to complete the first Spanish edition of Imagine YOU. Stay tuned for more updates.

Local Impact of Imagine You Health Empowerment

Amber Twitchell speaks about community and health empowerment.

“We owe the way that we do business, the way that we orient and think about young people in (Sonoma County) goes back to our involvement with Imagine YOU…it has had such an impact on us and the youth we serve.”

 -Amber Twitchell, VOICES/On the Move Program Director

Listen to Amber’s comments here.

New Imagine You Leaders Complete June 2016 Training Program

We are proud to introduce you to our next group of Imagine YOU Leaders, thanks to the robust sponsorship of Kaiser Permanente Community Benefit North Bay. Their generous support made it possible for us to award ten scholarships to this wonderful group of professionals working with the underserved across our community.

The Imagine YOU Project trains community leaders, health, and human resource professionals in the Imagine YOU Method so that everyone in our community can move toward their best health and life.

The next training program is coming up in November 2016. For more information see links below.

Program Information and Registration Form

Program Scholarship Request Form

Imagine You on KSVY Sonoma’s Wine Country Senior Hour

Dr. Ellen Barnett and one of our Imagine YOU® Certified Leaders, Annika Arreguin, joined host Leslie Alkire on this week’s Wine Country Senior Hour to discuss IMCF’s Imagine YOU® program.

IHI’s What Matters to You in Sonoma County

A 2012 NEJM paper by Michael Barry and Susan Edgman-Levitan challenged clinicians to ask their patients not only ‘What’s the matter?’ but also ‘What matters to you?’. The Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) and its then President and CEO (now President Emerita and Senior Fellow), Maureen Bisognano, championed and spread the What Matters to You concept, advocating for its inclusion at the heart of all health care interactions. The Integrative Medical Clinic Foundation (IMCF) located in Santa Rosa, CA is leading the effort to bring awareness of the What Matters approach to both community agencies and health care organizations in Northern California.

IMCF has begun work to build a collaborative group of community organizations interested in exploring ways to integrate a What Matters to YOU approach into their work. We will share ideas, challenges, opportunities, and materials that help organizations make this simple but profound idea a reality. We believe that the What Matters to You approach has the potential to transform the experience of both service providers and their clients. Our hope is that as more and more organizations in Northern California use the question “what matters to you?” to engage those they serve, individuals will experience services that are more responsive, and, therefore, more effective.

IHI’s Executive Director stated in a recent phone call:

“IMCF’s work to engage organizations with What Matters to You is unique among the ‘What Matters’ efforts because of the emphasis on engaging individuals in the community. This approach meets individuals outside of the health care system in a way that may expand their thinking beyond what matters medically. The information, of course, can be used to bridge what health means to an individual with health care’s role in supporting the best possible health for the individual. We are excited to see how this approach and the IMCF Imagine YOU® project can make a difference in health and health care.”

— Christina Gunther-Murphy, Institute for Healthcare Improvement, Executive Director

These organizations and individuals have already joined the community to explore including What Matters to YOU in their work:

• Sonoma Valley Community Health Center

• VOICES – Sonoma: Amarette Ficco, Health Navigator, Certified Imagine YOU Leaders

• MyCareMyPlan Sonoma County: Jane Eckels, Chair, Steering Committee

• Sonoma Valley Hospital: Kelly Mather, CEO

• Sonoma Valley Hospital Foundation- Cancer Care Sonoma, Pam Koppel, LCSW, Prog Director

• Sutter Santa Rosa- Oncology Services: Cindi Cantril RN, MPH, Director Oncology Service Lines and Patient Navigation

• Integrative Medical Clinic of Santa Rosa: Ellen Barnett, MD, PhD, Medical Director

To find out more or to join this community effort please contact:

Ellen Barnett, MD, PhD
, Director of Outreach and Program Development drbarnett@imcfound.org      
707-284-9225

Imagine You Program Included in The Upstream Investments Portfolio

IMCF is pleased to announce the inclusion of our innovative program, Imagine You®, in the Upstream Investment Portfolio.

For more about the Portfolio, please visit Upstream Investments Sonoma County.

Imagine You Sponsored by Kaiser Permanente Marin-Sonoma

Kaiser Permanente Marin-Sonoma Area Community Benefit just announced they will be providing sponsorship program support for the upcoming Imagine YOU® Leader Certificate Training, a program of the Integrative Medical Clinic Foundation, a local Santa Rosa nonprofit organization. The training will take place on June 21 and 23, 2016.

The Imagine YOU® Project, created and developed by Ellen Barnett, MD, PhD turns the idea of motivation and willpower upside down. Dr. Barnett, a family physician for the past 25 years, developed the project after realizing most people feel weighed down by their “should list” of health goals, and uplifted when they focus on what is matters most to them. She encourages people to view their health and life through the lens of what is deeply important to them, using that vision to guide their daily choices.

The Imagine YOU Project trains community leaders, health, and human resource professionals in the Imagine YOU method so that everyone in our community can move toward their best health and life. For more about the Imagine YOU Leader Certificate Program visit Imagine YOU.

“Assisting the youth we serve to form and create their personal vision of health allows them to form a direct and personal connection to their bodies and their own health. This direct connection allows youth to feel in control of their health and thus empowers them to value their health and make it a priority. The youth we work with have been “directed” their whole life; Imagine YOU doesn’t direct them, instead it stimulates conversation, leadership and engagement that insures their participation in the process. If every youth could feel connected to their health and realize the importance of maintaining their health, our community would feel the direct impact.”

-Amber Twitchell, Program Director, VOICES/On the Move

What an Amazing Year!

What an amazing year it’s been! Here are some highlights:

• We launched our first two Imagine YOU® Leader Certificate trainings in Santa Rosa, California.

• We created, developed, and published the Imagine YOU Leader Toolkit for certified Imagine YOU Leaders.

• We trained 14 Imagine YOU Leaders who have gone into their communities across Sonoma County to lead Imagine YOU workshops.

• We led an Imagine YOU workshop for 7 Santa Rosa Junior College students.

• We led an Imagine YOU workshop for breast cancer survivors, and one of them went on to become a certified Imagine YOU Leader.

• We led an Imagine YOU workshop for SonomaWORKS hosted by Goodwill Redwood Empire.

• With the help of our sponsors we participated in the county-wide Human Race.

  
  Thank you everyone for a great year and with your support we can make next year even bigger and better!

Imagine You and Cancer Journey Empowerment

Imagine YOU® is pleased to announce the receipt of a grant from the Community Foundation of Sonoma County.

The grant provides support to host the first Imagine YOU for Breast Cancer Patients workshop on March 28, 2015 in Santa Rosa, California.

In this two hour free workshop participants (women who have recently been diagnosed with breast cancer) will experience the Imagine YOU process and leave with skills they can use to get and stay empowered on their cancer journey.For more information please contact Cynthia Calmenson, Executive Director at 707-284-9225 or cynthiac@imcfound.org.

Imagine You Workshop for Foster Parents and Kinship Guardians

This year Imagine YOU® was invited to present a workshop to 22 parents and kinship guardians of foster children at Sunny Hills Services in Santa Rosa. The participants created a personalized Image of Health for themselves. Many of the images reflected their hopes and desires for the children they care for and for the family unit they are creating. They spoke passionately about how moved they were by the workshop process. For more information about Sunny Hills click here.

Here are some of the participants sharing their Images of Health:

Windsor High School Teens

This year 175 Windsor High School students developed their own, personalized Image of Health in our Imagine YOU® workshops. They each created an Image that represents why they they want to be healthy. These Junior and Senior students are exploring health careers. They learned first-hand about the connection between health goals and their own motivation and healthy habit formation.

Surveying the teens after three months, here is what some of them had to say:

“I put it in my binder as an image to help remind me why I need to keep pushing through school…I want to get to the place I drew.”

— Anonymous Student

“I think it helps really imagine and realize that your life could ultimately be up to you and your actions that you decide to make.”

— Anonymous Student

“I think other high school and possibly middle school students would like to do the Imagine You activity.”

— Anonymous Student

Santa Rosa Junior College Kinship and Foster Care Conference

This year the Imagine YOU staff led by Dr. Ellen Barnett, presented Imagine YOU® Workshops to attendees at the SRJC’s annual Kinship and Foster Care Conference.

Among the participants foster parents, educators, and area agency professionals. The Imagine YOU workshops were presented all day long and 120 participants created a personalized Image of Health to take with them. Many of the participants were very positive about the workshop content and felt it would benefit them as well as their clients.