Alliance Teams With Duke to Keep Kids at Home

DURHAM, N.C. - May 23, 2017 - PRLog -- Alliance Behavioral Healthcare has partnered with researchers in the Duke Division of Child and Family Mental Health and Developmental Neuroscience and Ben Goldstein, PhD of the Duke Division of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics on a project designed to use early intervention with mental health services to help young people avoid the need for intensive care in out-of-home settings. The project is funded in part by a grant from the Duke Institute for Health Innovations.

As the managed care organization (MCO) for public behavioral health services for the citizens of Durham, Wake, Cumberland and Johnston counties, Alliance serves a total population of over 1.8 million people. Ensuring mental health treatment for youth in their communities – and supporting them to live at home with their families of origin – is a priority for Alliance reflected in its plan to invest $41 million in Medicaid savings over three years in innovative, evidence-based solutions to the behavioral health needs of its communities.

The project will develop a model of statistical analysis of health insurance claims to generate real-time identification of youth at risk for needing treatment in therapeutic foster care, or in emergency departments at a point when psychiatric treatment in an out-of-home setting is the only option. While therapeutic foster care is an effective model of care that provides children with a combination of the best elements of traditional foster care and residential treatment centers, earlier identification of high-risk kids can allow them to remain with their families and in their communities while receiving mental health treatment, a less intensive and costly alternative. Alliance and Duke will team to provide them with care coordination and clinical services. The resulting predictive model and associated data analysis will be re-used in a number of applications that will help identify and intervene with youth at risk for needing out-of-home treatment.

"This partnership with Duke is consistent with our comprehensive population health approach in delivering a data-informed, collaborative care model that identifies and addresses the full range of medical, functional, social, emotional and environmental needs across all the populations we serve," said Rob Robinson, Alliance CEO. "Our goal is to improve health outcomes by focusing on wellness, prevention and person-directed care."

Visit Alliance on the web at https://www.AllianceBHC.org.