The federal Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) is continuing to fund efforts across the country to help healthcare providers improve access to pediatric mental health services.
In October, HRSA announced awards of nearly $27 million to improve and expand mental healthcare for children. The goal of this funding is to offer timely mental health support to children and adolescents by training pediatricians and other children’s healthcare providers in treating mental health conditions and by providing tele-consultation to bring mental health expert support directly to pediatric primary care providers.
In one example of another HRSA-funded effort, the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) has been awarded more than $2 million to equip and support primary care providers across the state to screen, diagnose, treat and refer children with behavioral health conditions.
With the grant money, the UAMS College of Medicine Department of Pediatrics, under an agreement with Arkansas Children’s, is developing a program called Children of Arkansas Mental Health in Primary Care (CHAMP).
The program’s primary goal is to promote the integration of behavioral health in pediatric primary care in Arkansas by linking primary care physicians around the state with a pediatric mental health care team for initial and ongoing education, consultation and referral of patients who are under 18 and have behavioral health needs.
The pediatric mental health care team will consist of a child and adolescent psychiatrist, a pediatric psychologist and a care manager. The team will work with a curriculum specialist and a diverse, interdisciplinary educational team to develop the curriculum and conduct sessions using a network-based learning and guided practice model for medical education.
“Pediatric mental and behavioral health is a pandemic in this country. With this large, four-year grant, UAMS and Arkansas Children’s can start to develop the best approaches to enable primary care providers to detect issues earlier and treat and refer more efficiently in order to make a real and lasting impact for society,” said William J. Steinbach, M.D., chair of the Department of Pediatrics and associate dean for child health in the UAMS College of Medicine and pediatrician-in-chief at Arkansas Children’s, in a statement.
“This program will allow us to set up much-needed support for primary care providers around the state who are the first point of contact for many of these children,” said Chris E. Smith, M.D., professor and vice chair for primary care in the UAMS College of Medicine Department of Pediatrics and medical director of primary care services at Arkansas Children’s, in a statement. He will serve as principal investigator for this grant.
The initial group of providers targeted through CHAMP will be those in practices that are a part of the Arkansas Children’s Care Network (ACCN), which has 30 pediatric practices and 160 general pediatricians in its network and plans to add an additional 100 family practice providers around the state.
The grant provides $445,000 each year for four years, with an additional $300,000 in additional expansion funds provided the first year, for a total of $2,080,000 over four years, in addition to any non-federal matching funds.
Maryland Behavioral Health Integration in Pediatric Primary Care
Another longer-term effort partially funded by HRSA is the Maryland Behavioral Health Integration in Pediatric Primary Care (BHIPP) program, which supports the efforts of primary care clinicians to assess and manage the mental health needs of their patients from infancy through the transition to young-adulthood.
BHIPP is staffed by a team of professionals with extensive experience in the care and treatment of children and youth with psychiatric disorders. Calls are answered by a licensed behavioral health consultant who can assist with resources, referrals, and general questions regarding children’s mental health. Calls that require consultation are triaged to a child and adolescent psychiatrist on the BHIPP team.
Child mental health specialists are available to provide consultation in many areas of behavioral health, and BHIPP offers opportunities for behavioral health skills training for PCPs.
In partnership with Salisbury University, BHIPP also provides social work co-location in primary care practices. In the co-location model, social work interns are available on-site to provide screening, brief intervention, referral and real-time consultation to PCPs
BHIPP offers provider- and patient-centered consultation via videoconferencing technology in three primary care sites in Maryland.
In 2019, BHIPP launched a new partnership with Morgan State University to expand this model to Baltimore City practices and address the unique needs of urban providers and families.
In addition to HRSA, BHIPP is supported by funding from the Maryland Department of Health, Behavioral Health Administration and operates as a collaboration between the University of Maryland School of Medicine, the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Salisbury University and Morgan State University.
