Nine Geriatric Mental Health Demonstration Program Grants Awarded

The New York State Office of Mental Health (OMH) and the New York State Office for the Aging (NYSOFA) announced nine conditional grant awards totaling approximately two million dollars designed to assist older adults with mental illness in New York State.  By the year 2030, it is projected that 20 percent of the nation’s population will be over age 65 with 25 percent having significant symptoms of mental illness.

Two separate Requests for Proposals (RFPs) were issued for the demonstration grants in the following areas:

• Gatekeeper Program - Designed to proactively identify at-risk older adults in the community who are not connected to the service delivery system.  Gatekeepers are non-traditional referral sources who come into contact with older adults through their everyday work activities. 
• Physical Health – Mental Health Integration Program - Designed to increase coordination, collaboration, and integration of physical and mental health services for older adults.

Three awards totaling approximately $500,000 were made for the Gatekeeper Program, and six awards totaling approximately $1,400,000 were made for the Physical Health – Mental Health Integration Program.  Conditional awards were provided to the following providers based on criteria included in each of the RFPs.

Geriatric Mental Health Service Demonstration Projects

Gatekeeper Programs

1. St. Vincent’s – Manhattan
   Working in partnership with Village Care of New York and with significant help from building superintendents and Chinatown community based agencies, St. Vincent’s – Manhattan Downtown Gatekeeper Program seeks to reach those at greatest risk, socially isolated mentally ill older adults.  The program plans to capitalize on the clinical skills and outreach capabilities of its partners to identify, establish trust, and initiate help for socially isolated seniors with mental illness living in downtown Manhattan neighborhoods.  Merchants, building superintendents, home repair volunteers, and emergency department staff will be trained as gatekeepers and receive ongoing coaching, support, and individual case feedback.
2. Family Services of Westchester
   Family Services of Westchester is the lead agency representing the Westchester Geriatric Mental Health Coalition, whose key partners are Westchester Jewish Community Services; Weill Cornell Institute of Geriatric Psychiatry; and the Westchester County departments of Senior Programs and Services, Public Safety, and Community Mental Health.  The program plans to train police officers and senior center staff as gatekeepers to recognize, identify, and refer adults with behavioral health problems so that they may be assessed and linked with needed services.  The approach is based on a successful Westchester County inter-departmental training initiative on elder abuse.  Full-time staff dedicated to the program will receive referrals, ensure linkages, and oversee the community response system.
3. Onondaga County
   The Onondaga County Department of Aging and Youth/Office for the Aging and the Onondaga County Department of Mental Health are partners in establishing a Gatekeeper program replicating the original Gatekeeper Program in a county with both rural and urban populations.  Building on prior initiatives to identify high risk elderly populations, the project has developed partnerships with agencies and businesses whose daily work brings them into contact with older adults, including major local cable and public utility providers, law enforcement, and apartment and mobile home court managers.  The program plans to establish a formal process enabling gatekeepers to complete a referral with one phone call.

Physical-Mental Health Integration Programs

1. Metropolitan Hospital Center
   In partnership with the Jewish Board of Family and Children’s Services, Metropolitan Hospital Center will co-locate mental health with physical health services in the hospital’s new geriatric outpatient center to primarily serve the underserved, socio-economically disadvantaged, mostly minority communities within its East Harlem, Northern Manhattan, South Bronx, and West Queens service area.  Mental health services will include pharmacological interventions, as needed individual and family counseling, and group counseling to assist seniors in dealing with chronic diseases, alcohol abuse, and depression.  The program plans to employ a coordinated chronic care management model to facilitate integration of care and evaluate treatment outcomes.
2. Flushing Hospital Medical Center
   The Department of Ambulatory Care and the Department of Psychiatry and Addiction Services at Flushing Hospital Medical Center will expand the integration of mental health care within the hospital’s primary care clinic to co-locate culturally appropriate services, provide on site case management and support services, and implement outreach and educational programs.  The program expects that the provision of culturally competent integrated health care will better serve and help establish a medical home for the culturally diverse geriatric population that lives in the eight unique racial and ethnic neighborhoods in Queens that comprise the hospital’s service area.
3. New York-Presbyterian Hospital
   On the Weill Cornell Medical Center campus of New York-Presbyterian Hospital, the Irving Sherwood Wright Medical Center on Aging will co-locate mental health screening, assessment, and treatment services with its existing outpatient geriatric primary care services.  The program also plans to integrate mental health services in the Wright Center’s geriatric medical housecall program, which provides primary care for homebound older adults, and to implement a case consultation approach for assessing and addressing the mental health needs of elder abuse victims referred by the Weinberg Center for Elder Abuse Prevention, a shelter providing services to elder abuse victims.
4. Warren and Washington Counties
   The Office of Community Services for Warren and Washington counties will oversee the multi-site implementation of a health integration program that combines both integrated and coordinated models of care in two rural counties covering an area of 1,775 square miles.  Contracting with a network of federally qualified health centers, the program will increase the capacity to provide site based integrated primary and mental health care and create the capacity to provide mobile integrated primary and mental health care for older adults living in the community.  The program also plans to conduct cross systems care coordination meetings for individuals with particularly complex physical and mental health needs, provide consultation to community providers, and conduct in-kind home based mental health assessments.
5. University of Rochester
   To address the physical and mental health needs of homebound elders in Rochester and its suburbs, the Older Adults Service of the Geriatric Psychiatry Program at the University of Rochester established partnerships with the Jewish Home of Rochester and Jewish Family Service of Rochester to deliver integrated physical and mental health assessment and/or treatment to homebound elderly in their own homes.  Training and resources provided by the Older Adults Service and Jewish Family Service will be added to the Jewish Home’s new geriatric primary care home visit practice to improve the mental health case finding skills of primary care providers, mobilize psychiatric assessment, bring treatment to the home, and provide continued counseling, care coordination, and outcome monitoring.
6. Long Island Home
   Long Island Home, d/b/a South Oaks Hospital and Health Partners of New York, plans to work with Eastern Long Island Hospital, the Town of Southold, and the Mental Health Association in Suffolk County to increase access to mental health services and improve the integration of physical and mental health care for older adults on the North Fork of Long Island.  The program will hire a mental health practitioner to provide screening, assessment, and referral to mental health services for residents in their homes, primary health care offices, Eastern Long Island Hospital, and the Town of Southold Senior Services Center.  Contracts with partners will support project marketing, senior center transportation, and a support group.