HAWAI’I WORKSHOP

AANHPI Trauma-Informed Care & Other Services: Bridging Community- and Evidence-Based Practices

Date & Time: Thursday, August 1, 2024 9AM-4PM HST (Registration starts at 8:30AM)

Location: East-West Center (Hawai’i Imin Conference Center, Jefferson Hall, Asia Room), 1777 East-West Road Honolulu, Hawaiʻi 96848
*Refreshments will be provided. Masks are optional.

Online registration is LIVE now. [REGISTER HERE]
*Registration is FREE

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About the Lotus Project

The Lotus Project is a Center for Asian American & Asian Immigrant (AAAI) Child Trauma-Informed Care & Prevention that provides technical assistance, training, and resources to mental health service providers, community health workers, school staff, and other professionals who work with AAAI children and families affected by traumatic events and stress. Funded by the Substance Abuse & Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), the Lotus Project is a collaboration between the Public Health Institute (PHI) and Richmond Area Multi-Services (RAMS) based in the San Francisco Bay Area.

About the Workshop

This workshop aims to bridge the gap between implementing evidence- and community-based practices in mental health services, particularly for Asian American, Native Hawaiian & Pacific Islander (AANHPI) communities. Academic researchers, students, government officers, practitioners, community-based mental health practitioners and program directors are welcome to attend this workshop to discuss current and past collaboration projects between researchers and community-based service providers, and issues of translational research and practices for enhancing health and well-being for AANHPI communities. This workshop particularly aims to connect those who are working to promote culturally competent and grounded trauma-informed care, health and well-being for AANHPI children and families. 

Learning Objectives

As a result of attending this workshop, participants will be able to:

  1. Highlight the collaboration efforts between researchers and community members implementing evidence-based intervention programs and practices for trauma-informed care and mental and other health issues for AANHPI communities

  2. Discuss current issues of translational research or practices applicable to targeted communities, particularly AANHPI communities

  3. Discuss community-based and culturally competent practices, programs, and rituals that aim to enhance community bonding, pride, mutual support, and physical and mental health

  4. Discuss strategies to facilitate improved collaboration between community members and researchers to implement the best practices to enhance mental and physical health for AANHPIs

  5. Connect with resources of the SAMHSA’s National Child Traumatic Stress Network

Featured Topics

  • Current research findings regarding translating evidence-based practices to community settings.

  • Lessons learned from community-research collaboration projects.

Welcome Note Speakers

John (Jack) Barile, Ph.D.
Professor and Interim Director of Social Science Research Institute
Jack Barile is a professor at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa in the Department of Psychology, the interim director of the Social Science Research Institute in the College of Social Sciences, and serves a the Senior Advisor for the Health Policy Initiative. His primary research interests include understanding the role of neighborhood stress in the formation and maintenance of health disparities, ecological assessment, quantitative methods, and program evaluation. He earned a doctorate in community psychology from Georgia State University in 2010 and earned a bachelor of science degree in health science and a master of science degree in psychology from Old Dominion University. 

Tooru Nemoto, Ph.D.
Principal Investigator & Research Project Director
Dr. Tooru Nemoto is Research Program Director at the Public Health Institute (PHI). Before joining PHI, Dr. Nemoto was Associate Professor, Department of Medicine, University of California San Francisco (UCSF). He has been mainly engaging in substance abuse and HIV prevention studies and service projects for under-served and stigmatized populations, such as transgender and gender non-binary people, men who have sex with men (MSM), and sex workers in the U.S. and Asian countries, such as Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Malaysia. He has been awarded a number of grants and service contracts from NIH, SAMHSA, CDC, HRSA, and private foundations. As Project Director, he recently completed a 5-year SAMHSA funded project providing trauma-informed care and prevention services targeting Asian youths in Alameda County. He co-authored a number of research papers in the field of substance abuse and HIV prevention and health promotion for under-served sexual, gender, and racial minority groups in peer-reviewed journals. 

Velma Kameoka, Ph.D
Professor Emerita and the former interim Vice Chancellor for Research and Vice Provost for Research and Scholarship
Velma Kameoka, Ph.D., is Professor Emerita and the former interim Vice Chancellor for Research and Vice Provost for Research and Scholarship at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa (UHM). In these executive leadership positions, Professor Kameoka led research planning and implementation support for the UHM’s organized research and academic units, strategic research initiatives, and research program and policy development. Previously, she also served as the director of the Social Science Research Institute. Professor Kameoka has an extensive research background in statistical and psychometric modeling for the assessment of depression and related psychological disorders, mental health disparities among multiethnic populations, and substance use prevention programming for high-risk youth. Her research and training programs have been supported by federal and state grants and contracts. Professor Kameoka’s federally supported research training activities have focused on developing next generation mental health scientists among Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander, and underrepresented Asian populations.

Speakers

Alika Maunakea, Ph.D.
Professor
Alika Maunakea, PhD, is a Native Hawaiian Professor at the John A. Burns School of Medicine, University of Hawaii, Manoa. Over the past two decades, his work has spanned a range of disciplines, including microbiology, immunology, molecular biology, genetics, bioinformatics, and epigenomics, with a specific focus on developing technologies to study DNA methylation and histone modifications. As a Native Hawaiian scientist, Maunakea is deeply committed to addressing health disparities in his community through interdisciplinary research and by fostering diversity in the biomedical research field. Dr. Maunakea co-founded and co-directs the Maui Wildfire Exposure Study, the most comprehensive study aimed at understanding and reducing the health and social impacts experienced by the Maui, Hawaii community following the wildfires in August 2023. This study is designed to identify sustainable and resilient strategies to prevent and lessen the effects of future disasters on affected populations. He also co-founded other public health initiatives, including the Pacific Alliance Against COVID-19 and the Hawaii Social Epigenomics of Early Diabetes.

Brad Nakamura, Ph.D.
Professor and Director, Center for Cognitive Behavior Therapy, Department of Psychology, University of Hawaii at Manoa
Dr. Brad Nakamura is a Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Hawaii at Manoa (UHM). He is a licensed clinical psychologist and the Director of the Center for Cognitive Behavior Therapy, a research, training, and therapy services clinic at the UHM. He has partnered with Hawaii’s Departments of Health and Education for the past 20 years. Within the DOH, he is the Director of the Research, Evaluation, and Training program and co-chair of the State’s Evidence-Based Services Committee. Within the DOE, he partners with the School-Based Behavioral Health program for various training, service, and research efforts.

Cynthia Taylor Greywolf, Ph. D., DNP-PMHNP, BC
Assistant Professor
Dr. Cynthia Greywolf is a citizen of the Cherokee Nation, one of three federally recognized Cherokee Indian tribes in the U.S. She spent her formative years growing up on the Cherokee reservation in Oklahoma. She was a fellow of the American Nurses Association’s Minority Fellowship Program (MFP) from 2015 to 2020, funded by SAMHSA. Her doctoral research explored a shared history of colonization and historical trauma with Native Hawaiians and alcohol use. In 2023, she completed a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Texas at Austin conducting health equity research with the United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians of Oklahoma.

Keawe Kaholokula, Ph.D.
Professor and Chair of Native Hawaiian Health
Dr. Keawe Kaholokula is a Professor and Chair of Native Hawaiian Health at the John A. Burns School of Medicine. He is a clinical health psychologist and translational behavioral scientist who leads multiple federally funded research projects to improve Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander health. He has leveraged community and cultural assets to develop culturally responsive health promotion programs to improve cardiometabolic health. He also oversees the Center of Pacific Innovations, Knowledge, and Opportunities (PIKO) whose mission is to improve the health and well-being of Indigenous Pacific People and other medically underserved populations in Hawai‘i.

Kelsie Okamura, Ph.D.
Implementation Researcher
Kelsie Okamura (she/her) is an Implementation Researcher at the Baker Center for Children and Families, a Harvard Medical School affiliate, and a licensed psychologist. Dr. Okamura serves on the training, consultation, and distance learning development teams at PracticeWise, LLC. She received her BA in Psychology with Honors and PhD from the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa. Dr. Okamura completed her predoctoral internship at I Ola Lāhui Rural Hawai‘i Behavioral Health and postdoc at the University of Pennsylvania Center for Mental Health. Dr. Okamura was both a NIMH Child Intervention, Prevention and Services (CHIPS) and Training in Dissemination and Implementation Research in Health (TIDIRH) fellow; and has more than 30 peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters. She currently serves as Leader for the ABCT Dissemination and Implementation Science Special Interest Group and is a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Advisory Group Member to Implementation Research and Practice. Dr. Okamura is passionate about community-based public-sector service system implementation, particularly (a) knowledge formation, (b) quality improvement initiatives that bridge team-based technology, and (c) financial strategies to improve implementation. She is currently funded through the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (Co-PI, System of Care Expansion Award), and has received funding through the National Institute for General Medical Services, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and American Psychological Foundation. As a fourth-generation daughter of Japanese and Okinawan immigrants to Hawaiʻi, Dr. Okamura has a deep appreciation of understanding diversity, culture, and contexts as they apply to youth mental health implementation. Growing up in a rural town in Oʻahu, Hawaiʻi has afforded her insight into the complexities of socioeconomic and cultural barriers that may impede successful implementation of youth psychosocial interventions.

Trina Orimoto, Ph.D.
Dissemination and Implementation Specialist
Dr. Trina Orimoto (she/her), a licensed clinical psychologist, specializes in improving health service systems equitably. As a dissemination and implementation specialist at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa's Health Policy Initiative, she applies over a decade of advanced health data analytics expertise. Dr. Orimoto develops data-driven tools to enhance healthcare decision-making for both Hawaiʻi's Department of Health and Office of Wellness and Resilience. Her experience includes leading multidisciplinary teams in mental health systems research, managing federal grants, and implementing state mental health legislation. Dr. Orimoto bridges research and practice, translating complex insights into actionable strategies. She has also provided evidence-based mental health services and trained healthcare professionals.

Kailene Nihipali Sanchez
Nā Kama a Hāloa Manager, EPIC 'Ohana, Inc.

Kimmy Takata
Forensic Peer Specialist, Pu‘a Foundation & President, Pacific Peer Connection

Naomi Leipold
Project Manager & Policy Lead, Office of Wellness and Resilience

Sasha Autele
Parent Peer Support, EPIC 'Ohana, Inc.