On Friday October 28th Simple Practice; an EngageSmart healthcare solution and leading EHR platform for private practice put on a panel discussion at the Simple Practice Headquarters in Santa Monica.
I was lucky enough to be invited to sit in and listen to this discussion, in which included moderator Rhitu Chatterjee, health correspondent for NPR, Dr. Thomas Insel, psychiatrist, neuroscientist and author of Healing: Our Path from Mental Illness to Mental Health. Jennifer Noble PhD, psychologist and champion for all marginalized communities and teens, as well as Conner Mclenanhan, Psy.D, clinical psychologist helping professionals overcome anxiety.
The main topic of this discussion was to address the State of Mental Health in America and how to close the gap. Having conversations like these is the first step to addressing the mental health crisis in America.
There are so much to unpack from the discussion, but I will leave you with the four main takeaways:
1. The National Mental Health Crisis: How to Address It?
Before COVID even started, mental illness was claiming a life every eleven minutes by suicide. We can all agree that the year 2020 made it quite evident to us that America is in a public healthcare emergency.
Dr. Insel shared that the number of deaths from mental health related issues, suicide, and drug overdose is 120,000 adolescents and young adults between the ages of 15-25. This is a 15-fold higher mortality rate from psychological causes compared to COVID. These stats are concerning because in terms of the population that COVID struck the most, adolescents were not greatly affected. Nonetheless, we can see that mentally and emotionally the lockdown itself took a huge toll.
Thomas continued to share of the programs that are starting to take place to address this crisis, for example the 988 federally mandated service program. This is a program that is being put into every community in the United States, which will add to a significant advance because of how this program aims to move away from the criminalization of mental illness.
2. The Disconnect between Mental Health Research & The World of Treatment
In Thomas Insel’s book Healing: Our Path from Mental illness to Mental Health” he points out that the United States has treatments that work but our system fails to deliver care well.
During the panel discussion, Dr. Insel highlighted that for people with a serious mental illness, their immediate crisis is taken care of; ER visit is paid for, plus meds and visitation. However, after that short amount of care, many are left on their own without rehabilitation services.
This is not the case for any other medical condition, for example, if someone injures their leg, they are not just given surgery, and left alone. There is physical therapy involved and rehabilitation services put into place to ensure a healthy recovery. On the other hand, if someone has a psychotic break, we do not think about rehabilitation services that can prevent many patients who come to a psych hospital a routine basis, in which cost a lot of money.
3. Mental Health Practitioner Burnout
Some of the biggest concerns discussed during this panel is that there are over 700,000 clinicians, yet we still find ourselves scrambling to link a potential client with a therapist, because several clinicians are either at capacity or burnt out.
This was particularly the case during the heightened state of COVID. Jennifer Noble Ph.D explained the pressure her and many of her colleagues have been and still are under. One might say that business was blooming for mental health workers because there was an influx of people who were in desperate need of care. However, it became a difficult situation to navigate when trying to refer a client to another clinician only to be met with unavailability. This is a difficult situation that puts many clinicians in a lot of pressure to want to accommodate everyone in which can cause burn out and mental and emotional strain.
4. Public Policy as a tool to alleviate the Mental Health Crisis
It has been just recently that the federal government is beginning to have a leadership role in decisions regarding mental health care and support. During the panel discussion, Dr. Thomas Insel shared how the White House just recently put out a statement that they were making major investments in the Certified Community Behavioral Health Center (CCBC).
Investing in these centers around different populations is crucial because it is these centers that provide “whole person care”, essentially acute and rehabilitative services for people with mental health issues. The main aspect that makes this investment worth it, is that it is funded prospectively.
Dr Insel explained that for an individual running a center, they have autonomy on how they spend the range of funds that is given to them regarding supporting their population. This turns into a value-based system of payment, where the focus is on how you choose to serve the population. This will help marginalized communities who have not been able to receive full mental health care.
Listening to this discussion led me to realize that there is hope for us in terms of the Mental Health of America. As a society we know the correct approaches to take, it is just about implementing them in a way that addresses the needs and care of the whole person.
When we understand that mental illness is not just a medical issue, but a social issue as well, our approaches will not just attend to a person’s psychotic break for that moment but will make sure they are stable and set for the next six months of their life and even more.
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