Erie Family Health Center

Its 10:00am and everything is set up in the Erie Helping Hands Health Center conference room. The food is out, name tags are neatly stacked and dry erase boards are set up. As the minutes pass by, woman after woman begin coming to the conference room. Each woman selects a chair and nervously awaits the beginning of a women’s community meeting in the four walls surrounding them. Women’s support groups (psycho-educational groups) are one of the new services that the behavioral health expansion program at Erie Helping Hands offers to patients. By offering psycho-educational groups we offer the opportunity to educate patients about symptoms of dominant mental health disorders (ex. depression, anxiety, stress etc). Group patients feel a sense of community and are engaged in care for the betterment of themselves and their peers. These new groups have been a huge success and a significant resource for women in the community.

It will almost be a year since Erie’s behavioral health department has grown. As Sheila Fleming, Director of Behavioral Health, recalls behavioral health was always a small group of no more than 6 people. Currently our department is now 15 people, including a Psychiatrist and Psychiatrist Nurse Practitioner who recently joined our team. An important part of our mission is to integrate care of both the medical and emotional concern of our patients. The behavioral health expansion program helps provide a new model of integration. We also help patients understand mental health myths and thus open communication of treatment.

Often patients do not understand how mental health services can help them. There is the misconception that medication is a requirement when seeing a therapist. Usually patients rely on alternative medication for mental health issues, often not realizing that solutions are short term. Mental health issues are seen as a weakness rather than a treatable condition even furthering patients not to be compliant with professional care.

To address the need for services and to reduce myths to receiving mental health services, Erie’s behavioral health expansion program provides many services. At Helping Hands we offer an annual behavioral health screening at medical visits, individual therapy, psychiatric evaluation and medication management, psycho-educational groups that are targeted at adult women and pregnant women 4 times a year, referrals for pediatric patient when seeking behavioral health services, referrals for substance abuse and domestic violence and lastly care coordination.

What is Care Coordination?  The Care Coordinator is the first contact once a patient is referred for mental health services. The coordinator helps link patients to treatment either with on-site individual therapy or psycho-education groups, as well as referrals for services not offered on-site. This position has helped patients engage in their care; if there is a question or concern the clinic has a point person that everyone has access to. Most importantly patients have a person to talk to about their needs first and help with fears about receiving treatment, transportation barriers and how to use their behavioral health referral.

Behavioral health continues to evolve and Erie has been very supportive in our growth. We as a behavioral health team are very proud of each other and the only other thing to say is “Goooooo Team!!!”