Hospitals & Institutions Monthly Report
December 2015
The H&I survey that went out to Intergroups (IG) in October closed December 15th. There were 13 Intergroups responding out of about 42 who were sent the survey.
Survey questions: 1, 2, & 3 asked where the Intergroup was located and the name and contact information of the IG.
Q. 4: Do you have members doing H&I work? Answer: Yes = 46%; No = 54%
Q. 5: Which institutions does your group go to? Options were prison, jail or community corrections, treatment programs and Not Applicable. Answer: Treatment programs = 23%; Not applicable= 77%. .
Q. 6: If so, how often do you conduct the meetings? Answer: weekly= 15%; Monthly= 8%; NA= 77%
Q. 7: How long has your group been taking meetings into this institution? Answer: One group had been doing it about 6 weeks. Another group unsuccessful in setting up a meeting.
Q. 8: What issues, if any, have you had doing this work? Answer: Lack of volunteers to do the work; still in preparation process.
Q. 9: What ideas or suggestions do you have for the ACA WSO H&I committee to assist you in doing this work? Answer: workshops or come show them how to do H&I work; find out what others did; give them discounted or free materials to take to institutions.
Results indicate a lack of volunteers from the groups to assist regularly in taking meetings into an institution; the other reason Intergroups may not be doing H&I volunteer work in their community institutions is a lack of understanding of how to go about developing the program.
Thanks to Mary Jo and Gloria for assisting in constructing and sending this survey to Intergroups. Thanks also to those IGs who responded.
Very little activity for H&I in December, only one request received from an inmate for literature, and that was in the last days of December. A couple of emails were responded to explaining how to go about starting H&I work.
The H&I Handbook should be available soon from the website. I remind people that this handbook is small at this time, but when people are able to start sharing their experience, strength, and hope in setting up H&I meetings, and sharing any information that others can use in doing H&I work, that it can be compiled and added to the handbook.
I also want to remind members that H&I work does not just involve taking a meeting into an institution. H&I also includes putting trifolds of information and meeting lists in physician’s offices, psychologist and psychiatrist’s offices, hospital waiting rooms, and any other place you have gained permission from to display the ACA literature. Remember to get permission to put out the literature.
One other thing, this is service work that a group can do with assistance from their Intergroup, and the literature, mainly trifolds, may be purchased or photocopied by the group or Intergroup to do this.
Submitted by Joan B
H&I Committee Chair
January 8, 2016
