Journal of clinical psychology in medical settings
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J Clin Psychol Med Settings · Mar 2012
Multicenter StudyImplementation of primary care-mental health integration services in the Veterans Health Administration: program activity and associations with engagement in specialty mental health services.
This paper describes the status of the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) Primary Care-Mental Health Integration (PC-MHI) services implementation and presents an assessment of associations between receipt of PC-MHI services and likelihood of receiving a second specialty mental health (SMH) appointment following an initial SMH encounter. The total PC-MHI service recipients and encounters/month rose substantially between October 2007 and April 2011. ⋯ Implementation of VHA PC-MHI services has substantially increased VHA capacity to deliver mental health services in primary care and findings indicate that PC-MHI services are associated with greater engagement in SMH treatment. Implementation of VHA PC-MHI services is progressing with new technical assistance strategies being deployed.