Starting this week, about 2,000 blind, disabled and elderly Medicaid patients in Snohomish County are getting mental health services in a new way, the first time the system has been tried in Washington.
The goal is to better coordinate mental health with other types of services patients need, such as health care or treatment for drug and alcohol problems.
Snohomish County is the first county in the state to try out the integrated health care plan, offered through Molina Healthcare of Washington.
The state Legislature asked the state Department of Social and Health Services to test the new system of providing services to blind, elderly and disabled Medicaid patients. The project is expected to continue here for three years, said Chris Imhoff, mental health administrator for DSHS.
“We’re hoping for good health outcomes for these people, which may save money along the way,” she said.
For example, through better overall health care, she said, there may be less use of hospital emergency rooms, where it’s more expensive to provide basic health care services than in a medical clinic.
In the past, mental health, drug and alcohol programs and health care services have all been administered separately, said Jim Stevenson, spokesman for DSHS.
“Even though they’re all with the (same agency) they’ve had their own operations and delivery system,” he said.
Approximately 2,000 out of the county’s estimated 16,000 elderly, blind or disabled Medicaid patients are enrolled in the new system. The switch already had occurred with two services – health care and help with drug and alcohol problems – earlier this year.
Terry Clark, a director for Compass Health, a nonprofit organization that provides mental health services in Snohomish, Island, Skagit and San Juan counties, said she’s concerned about how regional services, such as emergency mental health, might be affected by the new program.
There is money left to provide the community with emergency mental health services for everyone in the county, said Alice Lind, project manager for DSHS.
Yet Clark said she remains concerned. “There are so many other unknowns for all the mental health system, when you add in the Medicaid integration project, it further complicates a very complicated funding situation,” she said.
“A year from now, we could say, ‘Oh, this is a wonderful project, ‘” Clark said. “We just don’t know. It’s so unknown. That’s what creates the fear.”
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