Recently Funded Projects: Utilizing a Learning Collaborative Approach to Support Behavioral Health Home Dissemination

Funder: Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI)

Summary: PCORI funds Dissemination and Implementation projects to increase awareness and promote the use of PCORI research findings to improve healthcare practices and health outcomes. This project is proposing to conduct dissemination and implementation activities for the results of the research project: Helping Adults with Serious Mental Illness Improve Their Health and Wellness

Adolescents receiving care in residential treatment facilities (RTF) and individuals who attend opioid treatment programs (OTP) are at high risk for chronic diseases that often result from unhealthy behaviors, such as smoking, poor diet, and a lack of exercise. Finding ways to address physical health and wellness in places where mental health service users receive care can provide much-needed support to reduce the risk for or control of health conditions.

This project will use the Learning Collaborative approach to support the implementation of the Behavioral Health Home Plus (BHHP) model in RTFs and OTPs to improve the overall health and wellness of service users who receive care at these facilities. The BHHP manual, toolkits, and trainings that were developed as part of the project team’s completed PCORI-funded study focus on “health navigation” to address disease risk factors that can lead to poor health through the use of health assessments, development of physical health goals, disease self-management tools, and the teaching of communication skills to improve conversations between service users and healthcare providers. The project team believes that BHHP can lead to improved health and wellness for additional and diverse behavioral health populations who are at risk for poor health outcomes. The project team believes that use of Learning Collaboratives to support carrying out BHHP in RTFs and OTPs will impact several things. The project team looks to improve provider ability to deliver BHHP and understand the challenges in doing so and how to overcome these challenges. The researchers hope to enhance service user confidence and involvement in addressing physical health issues. In addition, the project team looks to support service users in the increased use of outpatient primary and specialty care and decreased use of emergency departments and hospitals.

Learn more about this project.

Original PCORI-funded Research Project: Helping Adults with Serious Mental Illness Improve Their Health and Wellness