5 New Behavioral Health Centers Created
Hospitals and insurers continue to add mental health capabilities:
Florida Blue’s behavioral health benefit manager, New Directions, acquired digital behavioral health company, Tridiuum, which has automated behavioral health screening, triaging, and matching capabilities. This acquisition was built from a partnership the two companies had, which within 5 weeks resulted in the screening of over 450 individuals and reduced the average speed to a first appointment from 25 days to 4 days.
The Flagler Access Center, a new mental health center, will open later this month in Bunnell, Florida, providing much needed behavioral health services. Flagler County has one of the highest suicide rates in the state. In 2020, the number of deaths by suicide was 20.9 deaths per 100,000 residents, up from the 2019 rate of 19.3. The center, a partnership between SMA Healthcare and Flagler Health +, will host a program to engage youth with mental health services earlier in their lives called the “Be Resilient and Voice Emotions” (BRAVE) program. The center will also utilize and refer to other social services so residents can continue to receive the care they need in their community.
Action Behavior Centers (ABC) will be opening 10 new applied behavioral analysis (ABA) centers and employing 750 new jobs to meet therapy services for children with autism in Illinois. ABC is one of the country’s largest autism services providers and the first two to open will be Naperville and Schaumburg. ABC currently has more than 70 established centers throughout Texas, Arizona, and Colorado and employs therapists, BCBA’s and licensed psychologists.
Blue Shield California members enrolled in the behavioral health program, Wellvolution, will now have access to Ginger, which will provide members with video therapy and psychiatry sessions and on-demand mental health coaching and activities. This follows the addition of Headspace to the Wellvolution program in October 2021.
Quartet has acquired telepsych provider Innovatel in the latest example of tech meets service delivery. The mental health analytics company has brought in the psych provider known for serving community mental health clinics.