Mental health care

Key facts

• For these three counties, check Alliance’s official service and eligibility information; the person’s actual coverage still needs confirmation.
• Use a local provider to confirm assessment and funding arrangements. For crisis support, call or text 988.
• Care coordination is available for people in Tailored Plans.

Official sources

• NC DHHS: LME/MCO directory
• Alliance Health: service counties and eligibility
• NC Medicaid: Tailored Plans

Last checked October 2026. Amounts and rules change, so confirm with the official source before sharing.

Key facts

• Outpatient therapy: regular sessions with a counselor or therapist.
• Psychiatry / medication management: a prescriber who manages medications.
• Comprehensive Clinical Assessment (CCA): the first evaluation that opens most services.
• ACT (Assertive Community Treatment): a team that comes to the person, for people with serious mental illness.
• Community Support Team (CST): community-based team support.
• Peer Support Services: support from someone with lived experience (that's you).
• Psychosocial rehabilitation and clubhouses: skill-building and community.
• Individual Placement and Support (IPS): help getting and keeping a job.
• Partial hospitalization and intensive outpatient: more hours of care without staying overnight.
• Young adults 18+ can ask local clinicians about early-psychosis services and each program’s age range.

Official sources

• NC DHHS: Mental health services
• SAMHSA: Treatment types

Last checked October 2026. Amounts and rules change, so confirm with the official source before sharing.

Key facts

• The right to dignity, privacy, humane care, and freedom from abuse.
• The right to take part in their treatment plan and to be told about their rights.
• Confidentiality, with limited exceptions.
• The right to file a grievance with the provider or LME/MCO, and to appeal Medicaid service decisions.
• Complaints about abuse or neglect can go to DHSR or Disability Rights NC.

Official sources

• NC G.S. 122C (client rights)
• NC DHHS: Complaints and grievances
• HHS: HIPAA for individuals

Last checked October 2026. Amounts and rules change, so confirm with the official source before sharing.

Step by step

1. Download the NC Advance Instruction for Mental Health Treatment form.
2. Fill in preferences: medications, facilities, people to call, things that help or hurt.
3. Sign in front of two qualified witnesses and a notary.
4. Give copies to providers and trusted people, and register it with the NC Advance Health Care Directive Registry.

Official sources

• NC Secretary of State: Advance Health Care Directive Registry
• NC DHHS: Advance directives

Last checked October 2026. Amounts and rules change, so confirm with the official source before sharing.

Key facts

• NIMH has plain-language guides on depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, PTSD, and more.
• SAMHSA's six trauma-informed principles: safety; trustworthiness and transparency; peer support; collaboration and mutuality; empowerment, voice, and choice; and cultural, historical, and gender issues.
• Ask "What happened to you?" instead of "What's wrong with you?"

Official sources

• NIMH: Health topics
• SAMHSA: Trauma-informed approach

Last checked October 2026. Amounts and rules change, so confirm with the official source before sharing.