The demand for mental health services has been on the rise for several years, and it does not appear to be subsiding. In recent months, following federal funding cuts and the termination of a national crisis helpline for LGBTQ+ youth, access to care has become a greater obstacle.
As funding cuts take hold in the coming months and years, reducing the capacity for services at a number of urban and rural healthcare organizations, access to needed care could become even more difficult than it is now. Experts have warned that emergency departments will feel the brunt of these changes as they see an uptick in individuals experiencing a mental health crisis.
In addition to more limited access to care, the estimated 15 million Americans who will lose insurance coverage in the coming months due to Medicaid cuts and the loss of ACA subsidies may allow conditions to go untreated for longer. This will likely create an environment where emergency care is needed more frequently to treat conditions that are more severe.
How does telepsychiatry come into play here? And how can it improve what will very likely be a more precarious landscape for mental health care moving forward? Here are five ways.
Integrated primary care
It’s no secret that navigating the web of mental health care options, either through an insurer or as a cash-pay individual, can be daunting. It’s even more daunting when a patient is also trying to manage a mental health crisis. It’s one of the reasons primary care clinics have begun integrating mental health support into their care models, on site.
With a telepsychiatry partner, like Iris, primary care clinics and their patients are able to realize all the same benefits of an on-site, integrated care atmosphere while scaling the partnership to fit the clinic’s needs. Iris telepsychiatry providers collaborate with primary care physicians so both providers have a whole-person picture of the patient being treated, making prescriptive care that much more informed.
In addition, this type of arrangement historically reduces the need for emergency care, as patients are evaluated regularly through a whole-person lens and then connected to mental health care within the same clinic if and when it’s needed.
The STeP Approach
Recently featured in Becker’s, a short-term psychotherapy (STeP) approach to care offers patients an evidence-based method that truncates the length of care but increases its frequency. The model aims to increase access to care by moving patients through a set treatment period faster. Becker’s notes that the program launched in 2024 and has already shown a 50% drop in no-show rates.
In this type of atmosphere, telepsychiatry could add capacity to a clinic that is seeing success with the STeP approach. A telepsychiatry provider could also offer a more traditional approach to care as other providers in the clinic navigate patients through the STeP model, diversifying a clinic’s menu of available services.
By adding capacity, telepsychiatry improves access to care and plays a role in reducing the need for mental health interventions at an emergency department.
Mental Health Urgent Care
Urgent cares that specialize in mental and behavioral health care are becoming increasingly common across the country, after the first opened its doors in New Jersey in 2019. These facilities bridge a gap in care that exists between regular therapy appointments and emergency department interventions.
Not only does a mental health urgent care provide services at a lower cost, but they also reduce the need for emergency department beds, which are scarce enough as it is.
When telepsychiatry is folded into this equation, mental and behavioral health urgent care facilities can expand staffing regardless of their geography, they can expand their service hours without increasing the need for on-site personnel and they can expand the type of specialists they have available to patients coming through the door.
Integrated specialty clinics
Becker’s recently highlighted the efficacy of an integrated mental health model within a gastrointestinal clinic, giving patients an opportunity to navigate depression, anxiety and other behavioral changes with professional support. The idea behind the model is to bring care to where patients are, rather than placing the burden on them to seek out the care they need.
The program’s results have included reduced symptoms of depression and anxiety as well as a reduced need for emergency department treatment and a decrease of “disease activity.”
With a telepsychiatry partner like Iris, specialty clinics of all stripes could follow a similar model to support patients from a whole-person perspective from the start, with the goal of reducing physical and mental health symptoms and minimizing emergency department admissions.
CCBHC support
Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinics have provided an array of core services to patients in their immediate communities for years, and now health systems are getting on board with the care model. Regardless of the type of organization that is transitioning into a CCBHC, telepsychiatry partnerships allow those organizations to transform by adding remote staff that might not otherwise be available in their immediate area.
Most notably, CCBHCs require a medical director. Telepsychiatry partnerships with behavioral health organizations that are transitioning into CCBHCs have long been fruitful for the organization whether it’s on a full-time or part-time basis.
Health systems face staffing challenges that are all too familiar across the healthcare spectrum, and telepsychiatry partnerships are able to meet both staffing and clinical support needs. By increasing access to care, and improving capacity among available staff, telepsychiatry providers within CCBHCs improve consistency of care and have the potential to minimize emergency department admissions.
To learn more about how an Iris telepsychiatry partnership could transform emergency medical response for your organization, connect with our team so we can better understand the challenges you’re facing.
