Early Health Impacts of a Primary Care Consultation Model for People Served by Assertive Community Treatment teams.

The cardiometabolic health outcomes and life expectancy of people living with serious mental illness (SMI) continue to significantly flag behind that of the general population. This study explores the possibility of using the evidence-based Assertive Community Treatment (ACT) model and infrastructure to increase access to primary care and improve cardiometabolic outcomes of people with SMI. Four ACT teams in a large urban area received the services of a primary care consultant who was co-located at a Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC), met regularly with ACT team clinicians to review a cardiometabolic registry of participants, and engaged participants in primary care services.

Self- Evaluation Tool to Support Implementation of Treatment for Tobacco Use Disorder in Behavioral Health Programs.

Tobacco use in people with behavioral health conditions remain two to three times higher than the general population causing premature death and impacting recovery negatively across several domains. Intermediary organizations can provide practical tools, training, and technical assistance to help programs improve capacity to treat tobacco use. This report describes the construction and application of the Tobacco Integration Self-Evaluation Tool (TiSET) for behavioral health programs, a 20-item scale inspired by the DDCMHT and additional content from the Facility Tobacco Policy and Treatment Practices Self-Evaluation tool that one of the study authors (JW) used previously with addiction treatment programs.

Integrating Primary Care Into Assertive Community Treatment.

Objective: This program evaluation examined integration of primary care nurse practitioners into assertive community treatment (ACT).

Methods: From January to June 2019, primary care nurse practitioners in a postgraduate fellowship program were assigned to five ACT teams (N=305 participants). Focus groups explored staff members' and participants' experiences.

COVID-19 in a New York City Behavioral Health Housing and Treatment System.

Objective: This study sought to characterize the incidence of COVID-19 illness, hospitalization, and death among congregate and noncongregate cohorts served by a New York City behavioral health agency.

Methods: From March 9 to May 3, 2020, data were collected on COVID-19 symptoms, testing, hospitalization, and mortality for 8,256 individuals living in 29 congregate programs (residences and homeless shelters) or served by 41 noncongregate programs (scattered-site housing or outpatient treatment programs).

Results: Of the 218 (2.

Telehealth Acceptability and Feasibility Among People Served in a Community Behavioral Health System During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Objective: The authors examined the acceptability and feasibility of telehealth services shortly after their rapid introduction into a community behavioral health agency as part of the response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Methods: Individuals receiving services during May 8-18, 2020, from behavioral health programs that had introduced telehealth in March 2020, were invited to participate in a survey regarding their perceptions of the telehealth services. Ordinal logistic regressions were used to test for differences in survey responses in three ways: between program types, between the 2020 sample and a 2018 sample, and between individuals reported by staff to be distressed or not distressed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

ACT for Life: Why Psychiatrists Pound the Pavement to Provide Care.

To better understand the experience of psychiatrists working on assertive community treatment (ACT) teams and the factors that may draw them to this work, the authors created a survey and distributed it through e-mail groups of the American Association of Community Psychiatrists, the Columbia University Public Psychiatry Fellowship Alumni, and the New York State Center for Practice Innovations ACT Institute. A second survey, with questions primarily regarding safety concerns for ACT providers, was distributed to respondents of the first survey. Responses suggested that ACT leaders should foster teamwork, fieldwork, creativity, flexibility, safety, and leadership opportunities on ACT teams if they wish to engage psychiatrists in this work.

The family empowerment program: an interdisciplinary approach to working with multi-stressed urban families.

The family empowerment program (FEP) is a multi-systemic family therapy program that partners multi-stressed families with an interdisciplinary resource team while remaining attached to a "traditional" mental health clinic. The rationale for this model is that far too often, families presenting at community mental health centers struggle with multiple psychosocial forces, for example problems with housing, domestic violence, child care, entitlements, racism, substance abuse, and foster care, as well as chronic medical and psychiatric illnesses, that exacerbate symptoms and impact traditional service delivery and access to effective treatment. Thus, families often experience fragmented care and are involved with multiple systems with contradictory and competing agendas.

An advanced practice psychiatric nurse's guide to professional writing.

Topic: Many good ideas are not communicated to the community of mental health practitioners because advanced practice psychiatric nurses (APPNs) are not being well informed about writing for public dissemination.

Purpose: This study aims to support APPNs through the various stages of manuscript preparation so they can enlarge the scope of their written contributions to the mental health field.

Conclusions: An appreciation for the skills, mechanics, and attitudes that support the authoring enterprise can result in APPNs enjoying the multiple benefits that accrue to those who write about their professional activities for clinical, administrative, advocacy, fund-raising, and other purposes.

Screening offenders with histories of mental illness and violence for supportive housing.

This article describes a community mental health agency's process of screening supportive housing applicants with histories of violent felonies and serious mental illness. The agency adopted its corporate intranet as a tool so that geographically dispersed senior staff could participate in information gathering in order to ensure expert input in admissions decisions. This broad-based participation was designed to maintain community safety, while making the agency's residential resources available to people with mental illness and criminal histories.