Manatt Health Senior Advisor Zoe Barnard spoke with Laura Dyrda on the Becker’s Payer Issues Podcast to discuss trends in the health care industry including behavioral health, virtual care, and how insurers are improving access to health care following the COVID-19 public health emergency.
In the podcast, Barnard explained how the COVID-19 pandemic brought behavioral health and telehealth services to the forefront of health care discussions across the country. She emphasized the need for expanded behavioral health care reform, especially surrounding mental health, and how initiatives such as Crisis Now—a comprehensive and integrated crisis care response network—may improve the issues in this arena. “Rather than being discouraged about the crisis in behavioral health, I choose to think of this as a watershed moment in our country… I think we can build a stronger work force by valuing our behavioral health care workers in a variety of ways,” Barnard commented. She also talked about the state of telehealth, its rise in popularity due to the public health epidemic and how it can be utilized to address access to behavioral care services. “In terms of integrated behavioral health and screening, we’ve seen a significant increase in hospital- and primary care-based screening over the past decade, but I think there’s a lot of work to do in getting mental health care to be synonymous with primary health care,” Barnard concluded.
Listen to the full podcast episode here.