Telehealth and In-Person Behavioral Health Services in Rural Communities Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Multisite Prospective Cohort Study.

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic triggered widespread adjustments across the US health care system. Telehealth use showed a substantial increase in mental health conditions and services due to acute public health emergency (PHE) behavioral health needs on top of long-standing gaps in access to behavioral health services. How health systems that were already providing behavioral telehealth services adjusted services and staffing during this period has not been well documented, particularly in rural areas with chronic shortages of behavioral health providers and services.

Change in Drug Use Disorders Identification Test - Consumption (DUDIT-C) with Telehealth Treatment Compared to in-Person Treatment.

: There is little published evidence for the effectiveness of telehealth in the treatment of substance use disorders. We analyzed Drug Use Disorders Identification Test - Consumption (DUDIT-C) scores from 360 patients who completed the measure as part of outpatient behavioral health treatment at rural clinic sites. Some patients received in-person care, while others received telehealth.

Comparison of in-person vs. telebehavioral health outcomes from rural populations across America.

Background: This study investigates outcomes from two federal grant programs: the Evidence-Based Tele-Behavioral Health Network Program (EB THNP) funded from September 2018 to August 2021 and the Substance Abuse Treatment Telehealth Network Grant Program (SAT TNGP) funded from September 2017 to August 2020. As part of the health services implementation program, the aims of this study were to evaluate outcomes in patient symptoms of depression and anxiety across the programs' 17 grantees and 95 associated sites, with each grantee having data from telehealth patients and from an in-person comparison group.

Methods: The research design is a prospective multi-site observational study.

Telehealth Utilization During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Preliminary Selective Review.

The COVID-19 pandemic reduced in-person visit volume and fueled a corresponding explosion in demand for telehealth services, resulting in the enactment of several temporary state and federal policies to allow greater flexibility in delivering telehealth services. This review examines patterns in telehealth utilization during the pandemic by synthesizing available findings from large-scale studies. To be included in this review, studies must be of original research, include data from 2020 or 2021, have a U.

The Impact of the Medicaid Expansion on Telemental Health Utilization in Four Midwestern States.

Low-income populations experience many barriers to accessing affordable, high-quality mental health services. One promising approach to improving access to care may be utilizing telemedicine in combination with expanding state Medicaid programs to cover low-income childless adults. This combination has the potential to reduce the prevalence of untreated mental illness; improve low-income populations' health and well-being; and save individuals', health care centers', and federal and state governments' money.

State Policies Influence Medicare Telemedicine Utilization.

Background: Medicare policy regarding telemedicine reimbursement has changed little since 2000. Many individual states, however, have added telemedicine reimbursement for either Medicaid and/or commercial payers over the same period. Because telemedicine programs must serve patients from all or most payers, it is likely that these state-level policy changes have significant impacts on telemedicine program viability and utilization of services from all payers, not just those services and payers affected directly by state policy.

Telemedicine Spending by Medicare: A Snapshot from 2012.

Background: Medicare has been one of the principal payers for healthcare services delivered via telemedicine to rural beneficiaries since 1997. Early projections of the cost of covering telemedicine for Medicare beneficiaries made legislators cautious to take on such a large obligation, but subsequent reports showed actual expenditures to be far below early estimates. As interest in expanding Medicare's coverage for services delivered via telemedicine grows, further examination of the extent of telemedicine use within the Medicare program and the costs associated with this use is warranted.

Telemental health evaluations enhance access and efficiency in a critical access hospital emergency department.

Introduction: Mentally ill patients in crisis presenting to critical access hospital emergency rooms often face exorbitant wait times to be evaluated by a trained mental health provider. Patients may be discharged from the hospital before receiving an evaluation or boarded in a hospital bed for observation, reducing quality and increasing costs. This study examined the effectiveness of an emergency telemental health evaluation service implemented in a rural hospital emergency room.

Walk-in telemental health clinics improve access and efficiency: a 2-year follow-up analysis.

Introduction: Telemedicine has demonstrated potential to improve access and quality of mental health services in underserved areas. Use of telemedicine to deliver health services may enable a range of synergistic innovations in care practices, but such innovations will require rigorous evaluation.

Materials And Methods: We evaluated a telemental health program designed to increase access by eliminating clinician travel time in a multisite rural community mental health center.

Telepsychiatry reduces geographic physician disparity in rural settings, but is it financially feasible because of reimbursement?

Telemedicine has been shown to improve rural patient outcomes in two randomized controlled trials, to increase access to many patients, to serve underserved minorities, and to train primary care providers. Yet, programs are dwindling even after successful grants due to inadequate reimbursement. Studies have been thoroughly done to gauge the payor status of potential rural telemedicine patients, as the "floodgates" are not generally open to all-including those who cannot pay-in typical grants.

A retrospective analysis of a child and adolescent eMental Health program.

Objective: New models of psychiatric intervention are needed to improve the accessibility of mental health care in the primary care setting, particularly in rural areas of the United States and especially for children and adolescents. The aim of this study was to examine the diagnostic characteristics and outcomes for children referred for eMental Health consultations at UC Davis (videoconferencing, telephone, and secure e-mail) from 10 primary care clinics in rural northern California.

Method: : A retrospective analysis was conducted on the diagnostic and clinical outcomes of 139 referred children who received a full psychiatric diagnostic evaluation via videoconferencing.

The e-Mental Health Consultation Service: providing enhanced primary-care mental health services through telemedicine.

This article describes the University of California, Davis Medical Center eMental Health Consultation Service, a program designed to integrate tele-mental health clinical services, provider-to-provider consultation, and provider distance education. During the first year of operation, consultations were provided for 289 cases. The most common diagnoses among children were for attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder-spectrum problems.

Use of secure e-mail and telephone: psychiatric consultations to accelerate rural health service delivery.

Telemedicine is one strategy to improve the accessibility and quality of specialty healthcare to rural settings. After nearly 10 years of video evaluation of patients in rural primary care, telephone and e-mail physician-to-physician consultations were initiated to supplement video and hasten treatment initiation. This paper proposes a model of using telephone and e-mail consultations before or in place of video consultations, because the latter are not always available or timely.

Models of telepsychiatric consultation--liaison service to rural primary care.

New models of psychiatric intervention are needed to improve the accessibility of mental health care in the primary-care setting, particularly in rural areas of the United States. Some models of service delivery have been successful in suburban and urban settings, but they do not always apply to rural settings. "E-health" innovations like videoconferencing, telephone, secure messaging (e-mail), and the Internet are increasingly being used to provide consultation--liaison service to primary care.