Trevor Duncan

I was born and raised in Yakima, so I’ve been aware of the difference that Comprehensive Healthcare makes in our communities for a long time. That said, I had a few twists and turns along my career path before I finally found my way here.

I spent much of my career as a Vocational Counselor. I enjoyed the work but, deep down, I’d always been interested in Psychology. Once my children had grown up and I had more time, I went back to college and studied for a doctorate in Psychology.

Just as I graduated, the regulations changed and the qualification I’d gained no longer allowed me to practice in Washington State. It wasn’t ideal but I knew it was what I wanted to do and I moved to California. Here, I was able to start the next phase of my career and I got a job conducting psychological evaluations for people who had applied for Social Security Disability.

One of the things I noticed was that the people who needed the most help were not really getting it from my evaluation. I was quantifying their impairments, maybe I was getting them some short-term, practical support, but I wasn’t helping them. I wanted to find a career path that would allow me to not just evaluate but also to help them recover, if they wished.

At this point, I was still down in California in a county called Colusa, working with a similar population to the people I work with here at Comprehensive Healthcare. This covered people with severe mental illness, adults, wide range of problems, a lot of trauma care, and significant pockets of generational trauma. I started to see, in a more tangible way than I’d ever expected, what the human cost – and the financial impact – was of cyclical trauma that repeats itself, generation after generation. I wanted to do something to help break those cycles.

I spent about a year and half down in Colusa and then came full circle, back home to Washington State. At the time, both my brother and I had health issues, and my parents needed some help at home, so we made the decision to move back, support each other and be together as a family. I like to say it felt like the cosmos was calling me home!

I knew I wanted to continue my career journey in mental health. When somebody identifies that they have a mental illness and seeks help, it’s a really powerful thing to be a part of their recovery.

I was looking for a similar set up to Colusa, a Medicaid subsidized entity that served those that couldn’t afford to go out on their own and get mental health care. With Medicaid, they can come into our clinics and not just get a good therapist, but see a nurse practitioner, a doctor, and get medication that helps or substance use treatment, the whole range of services that are sometimes needed for any given individual.

That’s what I mean about going beyond the evaluation and being able to help people recover. I’m part of a solution here and I can see the difference we make. It’s great to have the team of experts, the collaboration and the resources to change lives – that’s what makes Comprehensive Healthcare unique.

That’s important for me, more important than ever now that I am back living in Yakima and working in Ellensburg. I feel close to the local area. It’s a place where people work hard, there’s a lot of manual labor and outdoor work because it is a rural area. It’s exactly the kind of place where people who need help can feel as though that help is difficult to access. I hope we’re making it easier and making lives better.

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