Streamlining Digital Pathways in Community Mental Health Care
Clients with mental health and substance use issues often have underlying traumas and medical conditions, which makes having to repeat their stories both difficult and frustrating.
The Mental Health + Addictions Alliance (MH+A Alliance) was founded to optimize pathways to counselling and treatment services. But despite coordinating with various health agencies, a critical gap remains: a need for a digital pathway that links people across organizations.
“Although the province has made great strides shortlisting trusted electronic medical record (EMR) systems, these EMR systems fail to overlap across critical sectors, like hospitals, communities and primary care, creating breaks in client care,” explains Rashaad Vahed, CEO of the Canadian Mental Health Association –Halton Region (CMHA Halton) a member of the MH+A Alliance. Clients with mental health and substance use issues often have underlying traumas and medical conditions, which makes having to repeat their stories both difficult and frustrating.
“Currently, for example, when a client enters CMHA’s Safe Beds program, a short-stay crisis program in Halton, we collect information that captures their goals, level of difficulty and demographic information,” explains Vahed. “A lot of this same information is collected across other adult service providers, but when this client transitions to an addictions specialist from ADAPT for treatment, or Support House for support, these staff cannot access the initial assessment from CMHA Halton. Because each organization uses its own electronic record, there’s significant duplication and fragmentation in the client experience.”
To bridge this gap, the MH+A Alliance, with funding from Ontario Health, has engaged Calian, a software company, to connect and integrate the various EMR systems. Calian builds “interoperability” by overlaying individual agency EMRs and pulling data into a common viewer. This integration aims to create a more cohesive timeline of care, allowing for a comprehensive view of a client's journey.
With Ontario Health’s support, this digitally enabled pathway will streamline connections between organizations--and eventually sectors--to create a seamless flow of information and care. To date, the Ministry has provided $200,000 to pilot this initiative within the Safe Beds program, linking CMHA Halton, ADAPT and Support House. “It would be a leap forward if future phases could include integrating with hospitals and across Ontario Health Teams,” says Vahed.
Having a continuous record that travels with a client is critical to successful patient-reported outcomes. Having an integrated pathway will help the Province meet its goal of better understanding a client’s progress over the total care journey.
“The Safe Beds digital pathway provides a comprehensive view that compares a client's journey from beginning to end rather than individual chapters. “For example, a client stepping down from a hospital will have assessed mental health needs requiring medical monitoring. By the end of their stay in Safe Beds, this assessment will reflect a move towards stabilization. Finally, as the client receives therapy from ADAPT and housing support through Support House, their assessed needs will reflect that they have actually reached a place of recovery. Connecting that journey expands our view of the client outcomes and the true cost of care in our system”
One of the leading clinical operability projects in Canada, the MH+A Alliance’s Safe Beds digital pathway project was presented at the e-Health 2024 Conference. While the pilot is a significant step forward, Vahed says that integrating the step-down from hospitals in phase two presents an even more exciting challenge to connect sectors in a way that has never been done before.
“These independent systems can be combined like LEGO blocks, potentially expanding from Burlington OHT to One-Link centralized access,” says Vahed. “This system could ultimately transform Halton health systems into a fully integrated community.”