UW Health Implements Collaborative Care Initiative

Friday, January 12th, 2024 -- 11:00 AM

(Natalie Eilbert, Green Bay Press-Gazette) A lot can go wrong when primary care physicians refer patients with mental health conditions to counselors outside their clinics.

According to Natalie Eilbert with the Green Bay Press-Gazette, just 50% of patients referred for mental health care ever follow through with the referral, according to the University of Washington.

And most of those patients who do follow through tend to only go to one appointment. Individuals with depression and anxiety might have difficulty getting out of bed or they're prone to panic attacks.

They might not have the ability to complete the complex steps sometimes required for mental health care, which includes figuring out their insurance, calling multiple numbers and scheduling an appointment that ends up being weeks or even months away.

That can lead to patients neglecting their mental health until symptoms reach a tipping point, said Dr. Haley Humphrey, a behavioral health clinician at the UW Health Sun Prairie Clinic.

"All of these barriers that come with reaching out for mental health care end up leading some patients to not reach out until that severe range," Humphrey said, "which, when you're told you have eight months to see someone, that can be so deflating, and so disheartening."

UW Health has implemented a new program that gives patients more immediate access to their mental health care. The initiative, called Collaborative Care, puts behavioral health specialists at UW Health primary care clinics.

That means that, any time a patient expresses mental health concerns during their visits, the primary care physician can assess their symptoms, talk to a behavioral health specialist and bring them into the room to meet the patient.

Integration models like Collaborative Care are part of a growing trend in practicing medicine. Their aim is to get more specialists working in the same clinic and, importantly, incorporate behavioral health specialists as core members of the primary health care team, according to a fact sheet by the American Psychological Association.

Since its development at the University of Washington in the 1990s, researchers agree widely that the Collaborative Care model works, with patients getting better in significantly less time, in 86 days as opposed to 614 days of traditional care.

"Integrated care is really the most bang-for-your-buck you could possibly get when it comes to mental health care," said Shanda Wells, behavioral health manager for Behavioral Health in Primary Care at UW Health.

"We see people before they get bad. And we're seeing them where they typically present with these issues. Most patients don't end up in a psychiatrist's office, they end up in their primary care doc's office."

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