Agency Mission and Philosophy

The mission of The Edinburg Center is distinguished by our longstanding belief that all persons have the potential to learn, the capacity for change and the right to live a meaningful life in the community of his or her choice.

Our mission is to provide an array of innovative services which promote personal growth and independence, foster hope and enhance the quality of life of people with mental health conditions, co-occurring substance use conditions and/or developmental disabilities. The Center maintains a specific commitment to providing services to persons whose complex and challenging needs have typically been barriers to successful community living.

The core values and guiding principles which govern The Center's service delivery are:

• All persons must be treated with dignity, their human, civil and legal rights protected
• Diversity and the uniqueness of individuals is valued and supported
• Goal development and service delivery must be self-directed, recovery oriented, flexible and tailored to each person’s experiences, strengths, aspirations, needs and choices
• Services and supports must be provided in an environment of partnership which fosters recovery, promotes independence and maximizes an individual's potential
• Service provision must be goal-oriented, derived from evidenced-based practices and/or other current research and use outcome data
• Services must be provided within an integrated, coordinated and accountable system of care
• Systematic review, evaluation and changes in service delivery must occur to ensure that the highest quality clinical services are provided in the most efficient and cost-effective manner
• Services must be provided in an environmentally conscientious manner, applying sustainable methods when possible without undue burden to agency operations

Dignity and Protection of Rights

The Center believes that all persons are valued, contributing members of the community and that their thoughts and preferences must be respected. The Center is committed to ensuring that individuals who use agency services are provided with the opportunity to make decisions and to take responsibility for the events in their lives. It is our belief that these opportunities serve as learning experiences that foster independence and personal growth.

The Center is committed to complying with, protecting and advocating for all client civil and legal rights as specified by statute, regulation or case law.

Diversity and Cultural Competence

The Center values diversity and the uniqueness of all individuals. The agency defines diversity broadly as "differences which may be due to culture, ethnicity, religion, economic status, cognitive or physical ability, gender, age, sexual orientation or other characteristics". The Center is committed to ensuring that it is sensitive and responsive to the needs of the individuals and communities we serve and to the staff who are employed by the agency.

Individualized Service Development

Consistent with the agency's mission, Center services are provided within the context of the psychosocial rehabilitative approach or a positive behavioral approach. The overall goal of these approaches is to assist persons to be more successful and satisfied in the living, working and learning environments of their choice. The primary methods of achieving this goal are the development of skills and environmental resources that build on a person's existing strengths. To this end, The Center is committed to ensuring that all individuals using agency services play an active part in choosing, planning and evaluating the services which address their unique needs and which are essential to their ability to live successfully in the community. Guardian and family involvement is valued and considered an essential component of the service plan.

Maximizing Individual Potential

The Center's philosophy and specialized treatment expertise uniquely provides our most challenged clients with tools which capitalize on their ability to live successfully in the community. All treatment interventions, including those times when an individual experiences a psychiatric or behavioral crisis, are geared towards services being provided in community settings which maximize an individual's potential. If a crisis cannot be stabilized in the natural setting, an individual may access various Center services which provide alternatives to hospitalization. The intent of these services is to assist persons to stabilize the crisis and facilitate community reintegration.

Integrated, Coordinated and Accountable System of Care

Due to the range of services provided by Center programs to a large number of clients and other human service agencies, the varied settings in which treatment is provided and a geographic area which spans twenty communities, The Center has identified coordination of services as an essential component of care. The Center values its partnerships with clients and family members, funding and regulatory sources, community agencies and other stakeholders. The agency has established a number of formal mechanisms to ensure that clients have access to services in a seamless, unduplicated and integrated system of care. These forums provide for a review of referrals, service coordination, collaborative treatment planning and clinical systems development.

Goal-Oriented, Research-Based Service Provision

The Center prides itself in providing services which are innovative and based on emerging or evolving best practices in current scientific research. Service development and service provision is goal-oriented with respect to both organizational management and client services. All Center programs identify annual goals and objectives, develop and implement interventions and assess the effectiveness of these interventions at regular intervals during the course of the year. Client progress is evaluated in a similar manner by comparing outcome data to an individual's goals and service plan interventions.

Efficient, Cost-Effective and High Quality Care

The Center is committed to providing optimal service delivery to our clients. To demonstrate this commitment, The Center maintains a Quality Improvement Program whose functions are to ensure that services and individual programs meet agency service delivery guidelines with respect to the highest level of quality, clinical efficacy and safety in a cost-effective manner and to ensure that services are systematically reviewed, evaluated and improved in an ongoing manner. The Center uses a performance improvement approach to monitor, evaluate and modify the service system because it establishes organizational accountability, identifies needs and ensures ongoing agency and program development with respect to service delivery.

Environmentally Conscientious Services

The Center believes that services should be provided in an environmentally conscientious manner, applying sustainable methods whenever possible without undue burden to the individuals using services and/or agency operations. The Center’s Green Team is comprised of staff and people using agency services who are dedicated to planning and implementing an agency-wide sustainability initiative that emphasizes awareness, support, knowledge, ability and positive reinforcement. Consistent with the agency’s promotion of health and wellness in its service delivery, the ultimate goal of the sustainability initiative is for each member of The Edinburg Center’s community to become sustainable in their working, educational and service environment and to promote and practice this initiative beyond the organization to their personal and home lives.