From ECBH

 

East Carolina Behavioral Health is increasing rates for psychiatric services by 10 percent, with the goal of improving access to psychiatry services in its 19-county area.

The rate increase take effect today and affects the amount ECBH reimburses a psychiatrist for services rendered.

“This rate increase demonstrates the value we place on the expertise and commitment shown by psychiatrists in our catchment area,” said Dr. Michael Smith, ECBH’s chief medical officer. “We need to significantly expand the level of availability we currently have to better serve our region.”

Despite the prevalence of mental illnesses in the general population — one in three adults and 15 percent of children — many individuals with a serious mental disorder do not receive treatment. One important barrier to care is a chronic shortage of mental-health clinicians, especially psychiatrists, in rural areas. Psychiatric services are critical to the effective treatment of most mental-health disorders, particularly if medication is indicated.

“By raising the rate of reimbursement for psychiatry,” Smith said, “we hope to encourage growth in the number of sites where psychiatric services are available, either face to face or through telepsychiatry, predominantly in our smaller and more rural communities.”

Psychiatrists are less likely than other medical specialists to locate their primary practices in a rural area or in a county that has been persistently designated as a primary care-health professional shortage area.  According to national statistics, North Carolina ranks 20^th in the nation with a ratio of 1.05 psychiatrists per 10,000 lives. Within the 19-county ECBH service area, six counties currently have no psychiatrists and 10 more face a persistent shortage of this specialty.

“As a managed care organization, ECBH is responsible for filling gaps in needed services,” Smith said. “We are reinvesting savings we have realized since implementing the 1915(b)/(c) Waiver to ensure we have an adequate supply of psychiatric services to meet the behavioral health needs of people throughout our region.”

East Carolina Behavioral Health is a local management entity/managed care organization responsible for publicly funded mental health, substance use and intellectual/developmental disability services and supports for people living in northeastern North Carolina. The counties that comprise the ECBH area include Beaufort, Bertie, Camden, Chowan, Craven, Currituck, Dare, Gates, Hertford, Hyde, Jones, Martin, Northampton, Pamlico, Pasquotank, Perquimans, Pitt, Tyrrell and Washington.

To learn more about ECBH, visit its website at www.ecbhlme.org.