FY 2024 behavioral health service expansion - behavioral health and substance use disorders are a threat to both quality of life for DC residents and public safety

Addressing common stressors, providing medication assisted treatment and linkages to care for those with substance use disorders, and offering low-barrier access to counseling and medication for patients is paramount to improving wellbeing for washington, DC families. Bread for the city's behavioral health program provides counseling, short-term interventions, referrals, care management, and medication assisted treatment to primary care patients who are dealing with concerns such as depression, anxiety, substance abuse, alcohol use disorders, and more. Our behavioral health program is expanding in the coming year(s). We are adding patient visit slots (increasing by 40% our available behavioral health appointments by june 2025) as well as additional staff time (3.66 more in behavioral health staff FTE.) the centerpiece of this expansion is our proposed hire of a behavioral health fellow, who will provide extra support to our existing behavioral health staff -- seeing patients, but also providing strategic oversight of our program, performing outreach, and working with our chief medical officer and other leadership to grow our practice. This two-year fellowship is designed to revamp and relaunch an integrated behavioral health and SUD program, coming out of the pandemic where mental health patient visits were largely telehealth and limited. We also propose to add a contracting psychiatrist to offer in-depth medication management for certain patients with higher-need health conditions. All together, this expansion will allow bread for the city to better serve upwards of 460 unique mental health patients annually -- all DC residents living on low-incomes, and all regardless of ability to pay.