Patient decisions about changing health-related behaviors are complicated. Research indicates that passively receiving medical information and advice alone does not result in lasting behavior change. Furthermore, health professionals become frustrated when patients respond with resistance or apathy and do not make healthy choices. What reduces patient resistance and increases the chance of positive outcomes? Motivational Interviewing (MI) is an evidence-based communication style that has been shown to have a dramatic effect on patient outcomes.

• MI creates a partnership between health professionals and their patients, enabling them to work together as “co-experts” towards shared goals.
• MI helps people identify their own motivation for making lifestyle changes.
• MI is the opposite of telling people what to do and how to do it. MI activates discussion about change and minimizes talk about being stuck in unhealthy habits.
• MI involves specific, measurable skills designed to create effective interactions

This workshop provides practical skills for engaging people in the process of change and guiding them to find solutions. Teaching methods include lecture, demonstration, discussion, skill development and case study analysis.

Featured Speaker

Jonnae Tillman, PMHNP, DNP

Jonnae Tillman has been a trainer, researcher, and consultant in MI for seventeen years. She is a member of MINT (Motivational Interviewing Network of Trainers), an international organization committed to research, training and practice. Jonnae is the former Clinical Director of University of Washington’s Innovative Projects Research Group (IPRG), where she provided MI training, supervision and fidelity adherence for research with military personnel/adult/adolescent marijuana dependence and alcohol abuse. Jonnae received her DNP (Doctor of Nursing Practice/Psychiatric Mental Health) from Seattle University, as well as undergraduate degrees in psychology and addiction medicine. She has trained and coached emergency department practitioners at NYU/Bellevue Hospital, Miami’s Jackson Memorial and Massachusetts General in Boston. She also teaches MI as Adjunct Faculty for Seattle University’s graduate nurse practitioner program