Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2025 Jul;61(5):978-988.
doi: 10.1007/s10597-024-01438-5. Epub 2025 Jan 10.

Clubhouse Partnerships with Clinical Services: Current Status and Barriers to Integration

Jeanie Tse  1   2 , Kevin Rice  3 , Christopher D Landry  3   4 , Mackenzie Jenuwine  5 , Kinga Jedrzejczak  3 , Lori D'Angelo  6 , Daniel Skaggs  3 , John Delman  3 , Craig Bayer  3 , Gytis Simaitis  3 , Kali Rickertsen  5 , Elizabeth Ballard  3 , Francesca Pernice  5
Affiliations

Clubhouse Partnerships with Clinical Services: Current Status and Barriers to Integration

Jeanie Tse et al. Community Ment Health J. 2025 Jul.

Abstract

The Clubhouse model of psychosocial rehabilitation has supported the recovery of people with serious mental illness for over 75 years, but many of the roughly 350 Clubhouses are not well-integrated into the larger health care system, limiting their reach. This article examines Clubhouses' and psychiatric providers' interactions and experiences to understand the nature of and barriers to partnerships. The directors of Clubhouses affiliated with Clubhouse International were surveyed, examining their attitudes and practices around collaboration with psychiatric providers. To provide context, psychiatric providers were also surveyed regarding their understanding of and experiences with Clubhouses. Findings reveal broad support among both Clubhouse directors and psychiatrists for enhancing partnerships, despite current barriers, limited interactions, and the need for greater mutual understanding. Key considerations that emerged include the importance of maintaining the Clubhouse model's distinct non-clinical, community-based, and member-directed identity in any integration efforts.

Keywords: Clubhouse model; Community-based organization; Integrated care; Psychosocial rehabilitation; Social practice.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Declarations. Conflict of interest: The authors have no conflicts of interest to disclose. No grant funding was used for this project; all authors are Clubhouse employees or members other than Mackenzie Jenuwine and Kali Rickertsen, who are graduate students at Wayne State University, and Francesca Pernice, who is their academic supervisor.

Similar articles

See all similar articles

References

    1. Aquila, R., Santos, G., Malamud, T. J., & McCrory, D. (1999). The rehabilitation alliance in practice: The clubhouse connection. Psychiatric Rehabilitation Journal, 23(1), 19. - DOI
    1. Bahorik, A. L., Satre, D. D., Kline-Simon, A. H., Weisner, C. M., & Campbell, C. I. (2017). Serious mental illness and medical comorbidities: Findings from an integrated health care system. Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 100, 35–45. - DOI - PubMed - PMC
    1. Beard, J. H., Goertzel, V., & Pearce, A. J. (1958). The effectiveness of activity group therapy with chronically regressed adult schizophrenics. International Journal of Group Psychotherapy, 8(2), 123–136. - DOI
    1. Beard, J. H., Propst, R. N., & Malamud, T. J. (1982). The Fountain House model of psychiatric rehabilitation. Psychosocial Rehabilitation Journal, 5, 47–53.
    1. Chang, C. W., Chung, C. L., Biegel, D. E., Pernice-Duca, F., Min, M. O., & D’Angelo, L. (2014). Predictors of loneliness of clubhouse members. Psychiatric Rehabilitation Journal, 37(1), 51. - DOI - PubMed

MeSH terms

LinkOut - more resources