Path Forward Project Partners With Employers, Experts to Shape MH/SUD Care

APA and the APA Foundation’s Center for Workplace Mental Health have launched an initiative aimed at improving access to treatment for mental and substance use disorders.

The Path Forward for Mental Health and Substance Use Project is a national partnership leveraging mental health experts, regional employer coalitions, and policy specialists to improve access to timely, affordable, and effective mental health care for employees, said Darcy Gruttadaro, J.D., director of the Center for Workplace Mental Health.

“Employers understand that workplace mental health is a major factor when it comes to employee performance, productivity, retention, and disability rates,” Gruttadaro said. “At the same time, businesses are hearing from employees who are struggling to get connected with mental health and substance use care. They’re hearing about challenges in accessing in-network psychiatrists and other providers, wait times for appointments that are months long, and inability to pay for care out of pocket.”

The initiative focuses on the following five strategies:

• Improving network adequacy

• Expanding access to the collaborative care model

• Expanding use of measurement-based care

• Expanding use of tele-mental health and telepsychiatry

• Ensuring mental health parity compliance

These strategies were chosen because they have been shown to improve outcomes for patients, were endorsed by provider groups and insurers, and save money. “Still they have not yet been broadly disseminated into the infrastructure of behavioral health care,” Gruttadaro pointed out.

The Path Forward initiative has the potential to transform the delivery of mental health and substance use treatment, said APA CEO and Medical Director Saul Levin, M.D., M.P.A., who is also chair of the Foundation’s Board of Directors. “There is a critical need in the United States to improve access to mental and substance use disorder treatment, and by raising the awareness of mental health issues with employers and connecting employees to treatment, we will see an increase in employee productivity, lower absenteeism and presenteeism, and decreases in overall health care costs. APA and the APA Foundation have been developing resources for employers to ensure their employees have access to high-quality, evidence-based mental health care.”

In addition to the APA Foundation and APA, the initiative includes the National Alliance of Healthcare Purchaser Coalitions, with members representing more than 12,000 employers, and Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute, which provides policy and program guidance to improve mental health services.

“This collaborative of key employers and employer coalitions, allied with leading mental health and substance use experts, is totally unprecedented in U.S. history,” Henry Harbin, M.D., former CEO of Magellan and adviser to the National Alliance of Healthcare Purchaser Coalitions, pointed out in a news release. “It has the potential to significantly improve outcomes for all people with these conditions.”

The initiative started with a business roundtable meeting in spring 2018 that included psychiatrists, employers, health plans, business groups on health, and APA staff. “When we asked employers about the major challenges they face in providing mental health and substance use care, access was at the top of the list,” Gruttadaro said.

The initiative is focused on eight regions of the country and is enlisting the expertise of practicing psychiatrists through APA district branches in those areas. The eight regions are as follows: New York, Mid Atlantic (D.C., Maryland, and Virginia), Florida, Minnesota, Tennessee, Texas (Dallas/Forth Worth), California, and Kansas. ■