Welcome to the Behavioral Health Workforce Research Center's newsletter, where you can keep up to date with our research, presentations, publications, and events.
News & Updates
In this Issue:
  • Welcome, Dr. Marley Doyle
  • Behavioral Health MDS: Practical Use in the Field
  • Community Health Workers as Part of the Behavioral Health Workforce
  • Nurse Practitioners: Scope of Practice
  • Health Workforce Research Alerts
  • School-Based Health Centers
  • Points of Impact
  • Connect with Us on Social Media
Consortium Partner Update
Dr. Marley Doyle has replaced Dr. Howard Liu as the Behavioral Health Education Center of Nebraska Consortium Representative and Director of the Behavioral Health Education Center of Nebraska (BHECN). She is also the Director of the Adult Outpatient Division and associate program director for the Creighton-UNMC Psychiatry Residency. She is co-chair of the Graduate Medical Education (GME) Steering Committee and was actively involved in the visioning and execution of the new residency program application in which UNMC plans to start its own residency program in psychiatry.

A recognized leader in the field of gender equality in academic psychiatry, Dr. Doyle has presented 10 peer-reviewed abstracts at national conferences and has six publications in peer-reviewed journals. She is also a frequent lecturer in the medical school and multiple residencies at UNMC. She has won numerous teaching awards and is a member of the Gold Humanism Honor Society.

Welcome to the BHWRC Consortium, Dr. Doyle!
Practical Use of the Behavioral Health Minimum Data Set
The Behavioral Health Minimum Data Set (MDS) that was created and refined by the BHWRC in partnership with several of its Consortium members is actively being utilized in the field. Both the American Academy of Physicians Assistants (AAPA) and American Psychiatric Nurses Association (APNA) are using MDS questions and themes to collect workforce data on physician assistants and psychiatric nurses, respectively.

AAPA has ongoing data collection efforts throughout the year, including a workforce data component in their survey to all PAs and PA students (130,000 in their database) in their yearly compensation survey. This survey provides estimates for PAs in the behavioral health specialties. Within their quarterly PA Practice Survey, which goes out to a total of 24,000 randomly sampled PAs over the course of the year, they gather insights into the types of patients PAs are seeing and the work they are engaging in. As part of this effort, AAPA is also able to enumerate their membership engaging in behavioral health as well as in PA students’ intent to practice in one of the behavioral health areas. For more information, reach out to Noël Smith at   nsmith@aapa.org . 
Community Health Workers in the Behavioral Health Workforce
Community Health Workers help bridge communities and health systems. Studies suggest that including them in care teams improves patient health outcomes while decreasing overall cost of care. The BHWRC's descriptive study helps to provide better context of the roles of these workers in behavioral health.

The following poster with study findings was presented 2019 Annual NNPHI Conference last month.

"The Role of Community Health Workers in Prevention and Treatment of Mental Health Conditions and Substance Use Disorders"

Nurse Practitioners: Scope of Practice
Nurse practitioners (NPs) are registered nurses who have completed additional education to prepare them to deliver a broad range of services, including the diagnosis and treatment of acute and chronic illnesses.

Nurse Practitioners are one of four categories of advanced practice registered nurses, with the others being certified nurse-midwives, nurse anesthetists, and clinical nurse specialists.

Today, 28 states and the District of Columbia allow NPs to practice without physician supervision, with 15 of these granting autonomy upon licensure and 14 requiring a transitional period with physician oversight.

With support from the California Health Care Foundation, the Healthforce Center at UCSF prepared a series of briefs to inform state leaders about how NPs are regulated in California and other states and the impacts of restrictive regulations.

These briefs examine the evidence on how NP regulations affect access to care and quality of care. They also provide details about transitional oversight requirements and limitations to NP autonomy that can be used in future research.
Health Workforce Research Alerts
Stay up to date with the latest publications from health workforce research centers across the nation. Sign up to receive health workforce research alerts from the Health Workforce Technical Assistance Center (HWTAC).
BHWRC Project Highlight
School-based Health Centers as a Behavioral Health Service Setting
School-based health centers (SBHCs) are used to provide accessible, effective, and integrated prevention and intervention support to students and their families.

The range of services that SBHCs provide can be quite broad, including physical health screenings, oral health, health education, and behavioral health services.

This project identified the range of behavioral health services offered in both designated and non-designated SBHCs to determine the characteristics of this particular behavioral health workforce, characteristics of the schools and populations served, the types of behavioral health services offered, barriers to service delivery, and funding sources.

Findings indicate that SBHCs fill a critical role in providing a range of behavioral health services for students of all ages. Regardless of the setting, a staffing structure that incorporates behavioral health providers strengthens the center and increases the value-add of including preventative mental health and substance use supports.
BHWRC in the News
Demand for behavioral healthcare in the United States is greater than ever, taxing the already strained capacity of the broad range of professionals who provide prevention, treatment, and recovery services for mental health and substance use disorders.

How can the behavioral health workforce be optimized to meet this increased demand for the care it provides?

Angela Beck, PhD, MPH, director of The Behavioral Health Workforce Research Center discusses these issues in her interview with the Institute for Healthcare Policy and Innovation at the University of Michigan.
Connect with Us on Social Media
In addition to carrying out important research projects, the BHWRC seeks to serve as a convener of behavioral health organizations and practitioners, and to become a recognized voice on behavioral health news, information, and research.

One method we use to accomplish these goals is social media, so please like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter to keep up with the latest behavioral health news.
Behavioral Health Workforce Research Center | University of Michigan
Phone: (734) 763-3118 | E-mail: bhworkforce@umich.edu