Dr. James Polo:
What do you think we’re not quite getting right about physical health and behavioral health in terms of putting them together?
Dr. Nikole Benders-Hadi:
I think the good news is that many are really recognizing that connection between mental and physical healthcare today. However, I do think that there's a little bit more room to grow in terms of understanding about the impact of mental health interventions on physical well-being. Engaging in mental health interventions like therapy and stress management can improve your physical health. You know, lower stress can improve your blood pressure. Cognitive behavioral therapy can help patients manage chronic pain. Treating depression in cardiac patients is going to improve their recovery and cardiac outcomes. So really that connection with the interventions, I think we can do a better job at.
Dr. James Polo:
You know, in the past there's been a lot of talk about the integration of behavioral health into physical health. And I actually see it more like you do. It's the integration of the two together. They are synergistically helpful to each other. Better physical health leads to better emotional well-being. Better mental health leads to better physical well-being. Why is our collaboration, why are these kinds of collaborations, important from your perspective?
Dr. Nikole Benders-Hadi:
One thing I've greatly appreciated is our collaborations focused on developing and tracking quality metrics. So we focus not only on the access piece, but also on things like follow-up sessions that members are having, member satisfaction. Our approach has been about more than just getting members into care. It's about providing the best possible treatment and also ensuring a holistic approach to care. Any time these systems are fragmented, it just creates a user experience that allows patients to really fall through the cracks. Right? So pharmacy services is a great example of that. How we integrate care around substance abuse treatments or with primary care physicians is another, because the goal is, no matter what, which of these systems, we're really talking about when they're working together, patients are going to receive more comprehensive and coordinated care, which will improve outcomes for everyone.
Dr. James Polo:
Yeah, I think one of the things that you're touching on, which is so critical, is that healthcare is very complex, and there are many different entities that are involved in somebody's healthcare. So making sure that we have an ability to pull all the data together, all the clinical notes together, so that we can all be sharing the same information about an individual so that precisely, people don't fall through the cracks, gaps don't occur, and that we can make sure it feels seamless to the actual consumer, to the patient that's getting services.
Dr. Nikole Benders-Hadi:
Right, that's critically important.