Program To Prevent Behavioral Health Crises Earns National Honor

Main Category: Psychology / Psychiatry
Also Included In: Mental Health
Article Date: 18 Jun 2009 - 8:00 PDT

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A Minnesota program that provides psychiatric medications to low-income patients received a 2009 Community Leadership Award honorable mention from America's Health Insurance Plans. The awards, which were announced at AHIP's annual Institute in San Diego, recognize programs that address a community need.

The Mental Health Drug Assistance Program provides 24/7 access to stop-gap psychiatric drugs to low-income patients with severe mental health conditions such as major depression, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Administered by HealthPartners, MHDAP includes more than 25 local public- and private-sector organizations.

The program prevents psychiatric crises that lead to emergency hospitalization and incarcerations which cost an average of $12,000-15,000 compared to the average cost of $165 for a psychiatric prescription. A 2007 study of Twin Cities found that 40 to 50 emergency room patients with serious mental health conditions are admitted every month to hospitals in the Minneapolis/St. Paul metro area because they do not have access to community resources.

"This safety net program is more critical since the state is eliminating General Assistance Medical Care, which provides health insurance for adults living below the poverty line," said Donna Zimmerman, HealthPartners vice president of government and community relations. "Seventy to eighty percent of the services we provide for GAMC are for patients who suffer from a mental illness and as they and other people lose their insurance they will also lose access to medications," she added.

In the first year, MHDAP provided prescriptions to 300 patients. In a survey, patients reported that the program reduced the need for hospitalization by 26 percent. These results and the potential savings to the community, have prompted the MHDAP collaborative to explore expanding the program locally and to explore potential national applications,

MHDAP is funded by HealthPartners/Regions Hospital, HealthEast and United Hospitals as well as by grants from the Saint Paul Foundation and F.R. Bigelow Foundation.

Source
Regions Hospital