Atlas of Integrated Behavioral Health Care Quality Measures
The IBHC Measures Atlas supports integrated behavioral health care measurement by (1) presenting a framework for understanding the measurement of integrated care, (2) providing a list of existing measures relevant to integrated behavioral health care, and (3) organizing the measures by the framework and by user goals to facilitate the selection of measures.
Dr. Jürgen Unützer, Vice Chair of Psychiatry at the University of Washington in Seattle, and Dr. Neil Korsen, Medical Director at Maine Health in Portland, Maine, and members of the National Integration Academy Council played a large part in the development of the IBHC Measures Atlas.
In this video, they share where the IBHC Measures Atlas originated and the importance of the tool for the field of integration.
Video is also at: http://integrationacademy.ahrq.gov/videos
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My thoughts … Well, first I really have a real difficulty in grasping a fundamental term in the Lexicon (which is established by consensus), and that term is "behavioral health." Obviously (I would suspect) psychiatry is a central practice specialty under that umbrella, as I hope also that psychology, psychotherapy, counseling for persons with difficult or chronic medical conditions and nursing and support specialists such as CSWs, nutritionists, and palliative and rehabilitation professionals would overlap categorically (though not exclusively) …. oh, and of course general practitioners (whom I would hope retain at least what was taught in a J.C. level introduction to health & fitness class). So, I'm sort of at a loss as to what the "behavioral health" go-to person is supposed to be. The descriptions are sort of vague … becomes part of the "team" (group?) of primary care doctors (by geographical situation?), and then central to that "team." I guess it's just that "team" is already a term presenting consensus difficulty – "Interdisciplinary versus multidisciplinary care teams: do we understand the difference?" And in either/both applications the question of Managed, Patient-Directed or Coordinated Care comes up, almost always targeting "Patient Centered Care." So where "teams" of "primary care" come to rely upon a behavioral health centered role in a model for "integrated care," leaves me wondering where the patient fits in. What role does the patient play in the integrated care model? Apparently not the "center," role (as in all discussion, the patient is rarely mentioned (take this video & it's description for instance). When evaluating the impact of any health-related practice or service, for me the first measure that always comes to mind is – "[{improved} Quality of] Patient Outcomes [Care {health, life, etc.}]." But what do I know … I'm just a patient.