Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute Shares Results of its Novel Study on the Collaborative Care Model

In February 2024, the Journal of General Internal Medicine published “Extending the Clinical Impact of Behavioral Health Prescribing Clinicians Using the Collaborative Care Model,” a report detailing a novel study by experts at the Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute (MMHPI).

Authored by Andrew D. Carlo MD, MPH, Clare McNutt PA-C, MSHS and Hani Talebi PhD, LSSP, the report explains how the Collaborative Care Model can potentially mitigate mental healthcare accessibility and the healthcare workforce shortage by providing effective and financially sustainable care to patients on a large scale.

Researchers at MMHPI compared the number of new patients a mental health clinician could treat in a year under two different systems: collaborative care and traditional practice. The study showed that collaborative care is at least as efficient as traditional treatment and could help reach more patients sustainably— allowing clinicians to treat up to eight times more patients than traditional one-on-one care.

Andy Keller, president and CEO of MMHPI, said, “Expanding access to the Collaborative Care Model nationally is one of the single most important things we can do to improve and save countless lives for people struggling with depression, addiction and other mental health concerns. Most mental health conditions are fully treatable when detected early, and the Collaborative Care Model improves the ability to detect and treat mental illness as soon as symptoms begin. This is especially important for youth and young adults, as most mental health conditions emerge then.”

Research efforts such as this have catalyzed health systems across the nation to integrate the Collaborative Care Model, increasing access to care, improving patient outcomes, and alleviating the strains of the healthcare workforce shortage.

Read and download the full report here.