The project responds to a need and opportunity to leverage Massachusetts’ achievement of near-universal health insurance coverage to better integrate primary care and mental health services with substance abuse treatment and HIV prevention.
It has been argued that for those individuals who have relationships with behavioral health organizations, care may be best delivered by bringing primary care, prevention, and wellness activities onsite into behavioral health settings.[i] In 2012, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health announced the Integration Initiative, designed to “encourage the integrated delivery of health care through alignment of primary care, substance abuse services and mental health care services.
This effort builds upon the successes of our state’s health care reform initiative and the numerous efforts to increase access to patient-centered medical homes.”[ii] The BCME closely aligns with and supports that statewide initiative, and builds upon the success of the Boston Consortium Model in providing culturally-tailored trauma-informed substance abuse services for at-risk Latino and African American women, which were found to be effective in improving substance abuse, mental health and trauma outcomes and HIV sexual risk behaviors[iii]; we believe that the proposed enhancements (co-located primary healthcare, mental health services, and individual as well as group HIV interventions) will further improve participant substance abuse, mental health and HIV-related outcomes.
A collaboration with Boston Public Health Commission (BPHC), Bureau of Substance Abuse and Northeastern University School of Nursing.
