Spotlight on behavioral health

What are the main issues people you serve at Catholic Health face in terms of behavioral health?

The epidemic of substance use disorders is severely affecting our country. And, in the aftermath of COVID-19, we have seen a dramatic increase of patients who were afraid to seek help during the pandemic and became more depressed and anxious due to isolation and lack of treatment.

We are also seeing an increase in younger patients seeking help in our emergency departments, in part because it is difficult to find appropriate care for this population.

Catholic Health is making every effort possible to accommodate these patients and also to raise awareness of the types of programs available to them. In the emergency department setting, we have a partnership with the Family & Children’s Association and have developed a Sherpa program to help achieve a warm handoff to the appropriate program for each particular patient.

What are your top priorities in behavioral health right now?

As a provider of mental health care, our major concern is to ensure that we always excel in patient-centric care for all patients, all the time. Another priority is staff retention, to continue to provide the highest quality of care. Equally high on our agenda is to remain vigilant for signs of staff burnout and to effectively address it. Catholic Health has a program for physician resilience and well-being, along with other initiatives—such as Recharge Rooms—to combat stress for all staff.

We’re also prioritizing suicide prevention and have developed programs across all Catholic Health hospitals to detect, through appropriate scales, signs and symptoms of suicide in patients.

Tele-psychiatry has become an important tool to provide better access in our emergency departments. Tele-psychiatry has decreased overnight waiting times by up to 10 hours and ensures that any time of the day or night we have a qualified clinician available.

We’ve also developed a Central Intake Office that matches a patient’s needs to the appropriate facility, also reducing the time patients spend in the emergency department, and our Advanced Discharge Program helps patients find the appropriate receiving facility.

What impact did the pandemic have on our approach to behavioral health?

The pandemic increased the need for behavioral health and accelerated virtual treatments, providing care to a greater number of patients and possibly new populations. That’s been a good thing, as it has allowed more patients to be cared for from their homes.

To learn more about behavioral health and substance use disorder services, visit chsli.org/behavioral-health.