Transforming Care With an HIE in the Behavioral Health Setting

Avera Health in partnership with the South Dakota Health Link (South Dakota’s Health Information Exchange) have developed a collaboration with strategies to transform care delivery in the behavioral healthcare setting. The collaboration has allowed the region’s leader in behavioral health to effectively obtain critical patient information with a unique care delivery model to assess and treat mental health and substance use disorders. This care delivery model is a partnership between the county, city, and another healthcare system in the region, to provide 24/7 access to patients experiencing a mental health crisis or in need of substance abuse intervention. The collaboration has also allowed the healthcare system to retrospectively review data in the state of South Dakota to better understand how to stop suicides and opioid related deaths. Too often healthcare systems provide or implement intervention without the opportunity to evaluate outcomes. This collaboration has allowed the healthcare system to evaluate differences in demographics, risk factors versus protective factors, assessment, and treatment strategies to positively impact the fight against suicide and opioid related deaths.