Urban and rural mental health counselors need to demonstrate Oneness!
77 percent of U.S. counties have a severe shortage of mental health workers, according to the SAMSHA’s 2013 Report to Congress on the Nation’s Substance Abuse and Mental Health Workforce Issues. This shortage is most common in counties with low per capita income and in rural areas. This is relevant to us Mental health Counselors because our membership recruitment efforts in each of our states too often overlooks both rural and impoverished counties.
In Florida only one third of the 67 counties had FMHCA members. What about the other counties? Are there no mental health counselors out there?
How to change these numbers: As part of our effort to advance CMHC’s role in integrated medicine, AMHCA and our state chapters should make a concerted effort in membership recruitment to reach out to CMHC’s in counties in each state where there is a shortage of mental health workers. The rationale is that they need our support and technical assistance to be able to fill the role of Behavioral Health Consultants in the medical settings in these under-served locales in our country.
CMHC’s in private practice and in public and private agencies need to demonstrate oneness!
In 2011 there were over 120,000 licensed professional and mental health counselors, yet ACA has about 50,000 members and AMHCA had over 7,000 members. Why the big discrepancy? I say it is because we as professional associations have been remiss in reaching out to counselors in public, non-profit and private agencies. These folks are the ones on the front line of the integration of mental health services into primary medicine. All of the federal efforts from SAMSHA has been on focusing getting these agencies to become collaborative partners with medical settings. SAMSHA is not going after private practitioners because the work of integrated medicine requires a great time commitment, typically full-time. They prefer to go to the agencies who contract out their full-time employees to become behavioral health consultants.
How to change these numbers: Time has come for AMHCA and our state chapters to do a more concerted effort at recruiting these agency licensed counselors to join us in our efforts to become recognized as a recognized mental health field in integrated medicine. We must reach out to these agency counselors and let them know that they are one with us clinical mental health counselors in other settings. We need to re-look at the offerings of our professional organizations at the state and national level so that we embrace, welcome and make at home the agency counselors out there who feel alienated from these professional associations.
Medicare coverage for CMHC’s will help out agency and rural practitioners to help them feel they are one with those in urban settings:
Nearly 80 million Americans live in a mental health shortage area, according to the National Council for Behavioral Health (NCBH) (June 18, 2015). The 2015 proposed legislation H.R. 2759 would increase patients’ access to behavioral health providers, specifically in under-served, rural areas. According to the NCBH, the bipartisan legislation, introduced by Representatives Christopher Gibson (R-NY) and Mike Thompson (D-CA), is the latest version of similar bills that have won support in previous sessions of Congress but have never been enacted into law. In expanding Medicare reimbursement for Mental Health Counselors and Marriage and Family therapist, the NCBH states such legislation: “has the potential to dramatically expand patients’ access to care by expanding the mental health workforce that can provide services under Medicare.”
Out that, according to NCBH, nearly one in five Medicare beneficiaries – including seniors and people with disabilities – are living with a mental health or substance use disorder. They also pointed out that older Americans (those 65 and older) have higher rates of mental illness and suicide than any other demographic and have the highest rates of mental health related hospitalizations. Yet they are the least likely to receive mental health services, with only one in five receiving needed therapy.
How to change these numbers: As part of our effort in promoting the inclusion of CMHC’s under Medicare coverage it is important to emphasize that “we are one” with the current Medicare recipients.Seniors over 65 and people with disabilities will have their needs met in the Integrated Medicine Models cropping up all over the country..