About Mental Health Integration

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Guiding Principles & Indicators

• Patients will receive comprehensive healthcare in their medical care settings, which will include attention to both physical and emotional health. Care will be offered by an integrated team consisting of a medical care provider, clinical staff, a care manager and on-site mental health clinician(s). 
• Patients will receive services in the most appropriate setting possible, determined by patient preference and clinical need. The integrated care team will link patients to specialty mental health services in the community. Communication and coordination between medical and mental healthcare will lead to high-quality care.
• The healthcare payment system will make integrated mental health services sustainable. Rules about how insurance companies and others pay for healthcare will be changed to remove current barriers to working together. This will include payment for care coordination.

Guiding Principles	Indicators
1. The patient and family are the center of care	Improved patient clinical and functional outcomes and improved patient satisfaction
2. Level of intervention is matched to level of need Standardized screening and assessment	Use of a standardized screening tool, linked to mental health assessment
3. Integrated practice Well-functioning care team Communication among primary care, mental health and care management Coordination of care for patient and family	Regular team meetings Improved provider and staff satisfaction Improvements on the site self-assessment Mental health specialist in each primary care practice Care manager in each primary care practice
4. Biopsychosocial focus of care	Use of health and behavior codes in billing
5. Access to specialty mental healthcare Patient access to care Brief, focused mental health interventions in primary care Primary care provider access to consult	Time to third next available appointment for the mental health specialist in primary care Improved provider satisfaction Access to informal psychiatry consults
6. Sustainable model of mental healthcare in primary care	Mental health professionals in primary care offices being reimbursed at a sustainable level
7. Links to community resources	Primary care connections with NAMI and other community mental health resources