Telepsychiatry For Primary Care & Integrated Care

innovaTel Telepsychiatry’s experience with integrating telepsychiatry into the primary care setting has resulted in workflows that allow for different services based on your organizations’ need. 

Statistics

Over 60% of primary care visits are mental health related.

The national average wait time for patients to see a mental health professional is 7.5 weeks, in many communities, it can be months.

What is integrated care?

Integrated care is the coordination of general and behavioral health care. It has produced  the best outcomes and is the most effective approach to caring for patients with multiple healthcare needs. Primary care settings have become the gateway to the behavioral health system, and primary care providers need support and resources to screen and treat patients. 

innovaTel's Integrated Care Models

innovaTel offers three models for primary care organizations to implement telepsychiatry (consultative, co-located and full service integrated care model).

#1

Consultative Model/ Curbside Consult

The innovaTel psychiatrist provides consult time for the primary care physician or a care manager to review the most complex patients without seeing the patients directly. This is an extremely efficient model that can cover several patients per hour. 

#2

Full Service Model

This is a combination of the curbside consult and co-located model where the telepsychiatrist will provide consultative care with your primary care team and also carry a patient caseload for direct patient treatment.  

#3

Co-Located Model

innovaTel Telepsychiatry can provide direct care to your patient in the same location. Think of this model just as if you were to hire a psychiatrist on site and is located in your facility. There is no difference here other than the psychiatrist will connect virtually.

With this model, the telepsychiatrists can provide psychiatric evaluations and carry a caseload for on-going medication management, or often times can provide an evaluation with scheduled follow up for stabilization of medications and then return the patient back to your primary care team.

Behavioral Health Services

Behavioral health statistics tell us that many patients are seeking mental health care with their primary care provider. There are a few factors that can lead to this:
  • Patients have an established relationship and are more comfortable with their primary care provider.
  • Patients don’t want to see a psychiatrist due to the mental health stigma.
  • The wait times are too long to see a psychiatrist and access to care is faster in the primary care setting.
In a typical primary care office, primary care clinicians are challenged with accessing psychiatric resources and patients are often referred to a psychiatrist where they are faced with long wait times for an appointment. When patients are referred out, two things can happen that lead to a decrease in treatment outcomes:
  • The patient may not follow through with the referral.
  • The patient follows the referral, but experiences significant wait times to see a psychiatrist and cause delay in treatment.
 

Getting Started with Integrated Care

There are two important items to establish prior to getting started with integrated care:

Dedicate a telepsychiatry room

The setup is simple and we can provide detailed technical recommendations.

Determine the level of psychiatric services you would like to offer your patients.

Based on this data, we can make recommendations for the amount of psychiatric time your organization may need on a weekly basis.

  • How many patients are you referring out for psychiatric services?
  • How many patients in your EMR have a behavioral health diagnosis?
  • Determine the weekly telepsychiatry schedule (for example: Monday’s and Friday’s from 9 am – 5 pm). Keep in mind your patients will still be coming to your office and vitals will need to be obtained prior to seeing the telepsychiatrist.

 

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