When the BH2I project announcement became available the Health and Social Services Departments reached out to a Licensed Professional Counselor, who had previously worked with JBCI, to help write the grant application. Prior to being awarded the grant, we worked as a team to establish goals which would facilitate our ability to provide behavioral health services within our Health Clinic and improve integration, access, acceptance, and availability for tribal members and their families. For the first year, we set a total of 14 goals in the areas of behavioral health, medical services, collaboration, events, and billing. As of the conclusion of the first quarter, we have made significant strides in reaching 10 of those goals.
Our BH2I project is titled CHAMP, Choctaw Health and Mental Partnership, and is currently facilitated by our team of seven individuals who are representatives from the Health, Social Services, and Cultural Departments. In addition to having our team in place, we have been working collaboratively to establish our policies and procedures, equip the BH office, complete training, and work towards solutions for medical recordkeeping and billing, including potential EHR systems. We have also actively been working to reduce the stigma associated with accessing services through our quadruple aim approach (Primary Care, Behavioral Health, Cultural/Traditional Health Practices, and Social Determinants) by utilizing warm hand-offs to connect tribal members with resources, facilitating quarterly events (Snack and Sack events: Positive Fun), assisting with cultural honor and remembrance days (MMIW), and making the most of opportunities for outreach at other tribal events including the Easter egg hunt event, summer camp for our tribal children, CCHAT, and most recently, the JBCI Employee Training Retreat. As of this point our CHAMP program has been able to improve interdepartmental collaboration through huddle meetings, provide checkins and Solution Focused Brief Therapy in the exam room setting, and provide more extensive behavioral health services as needed on non-clinic days with eight (8) active cases and three (3) pending. Also, the Health Department has continued to improve and maintain the medical services in place including monitoring chronic diseases such as diabetes through IHS/GPRA measures and IHS Diabetes Best Practices.
We are excited about the progress we have made so far and feel one of the strengths of our program is the behavioral health component now available to tribal members and the increase of seeking both physical (primary healthcare) and behavioral health services in one visit/appointment day. While we still have areas to improve workflow such as scheduling and the intricacies of program development, our departments have always worked closely together and look forward to continuing to grow through our CHAMP journey.
