Hi, everyone. This is Erica Spicer Mason with
Becker's Healthcare. Thank you so much for tuning
into the Becker's Payer Issues podcast series.
So today we're going to talk about how
health plans can play a role in delivering
the right mental health care services at the
right
time. And joining me for this conversation is
Jenna Glover,
chief clinical officer at Headspace.
Jenna, welcome to the podcast. Thank you so
much for making time for Becker's today.
Oh, yes. Thank you for having me.
We're so happy to have you with us.
And before we get into our discussion on
mental health care and all of the important
components that play into that, I wanted to
give you the opportunity to just share a
little bit about yourself and your work in
health care with our listeners.
Yeah. So I'm a licensed clinical psychologist. And,
you know, my journey in mental health care
spans the past two decades. I've worked in
a wide range of clinical settings. So I've
been in community mental health, in large hospital
systems.
And before before joining Headspace, I served as
an associate professor. I was in the department
of psychiatry at the University of Colorado, and
I had an appointment at Children's Hospital Colorado.
And this was during the COVID nineteen pandemic,
and I really witnessed firsthand how broken our
mental health system had become.
So we had many times where we had
dozens of children in our emergency department waiting
for urgent mental health evaluations.
Some of those kids had to wait between
twenty four to forty eight hours because we
just did not have enough space or providers
to give them timely access to care.
And that wasn't really unique to our hospital
that was happening across the country.
And I would say that that experience was
a turning point for me, that I knew
I wanted to create something different and something
better. And so that's why I came to
Headspace to really reimagine
how mental health care is delivered
so people get access to effective care when
they need it.
So, you know, one of the things we
do at Headspace
is providing a comprehensive ecosystem of care, and
we support health plans and employers to offer
solutions
that really meet people where they are. And
we have that full spectrum of subclinical care,
of meditation and coaching,
up to clinical care of therapy and psychiatry
and care navigation.
Well, Jenna, thank you so much for telling
us a little bit more about yourself and
really what drives and motivates you to do
this work. You know, Headspace, I think, is
a kind of a household name at this
point in in terms of
apps and innovative ways to receive care. So
excited to have your perspective from both the
provider and and now at Headspace.
And you touched on kind of this this
big issue that we're seeing in the demand
for behavioral health and mental health services versus
supply of providers.
And we know that studies show that mental
health disparities could actually cost The US up
to $14,000,000,000,000
by the year 02/1940.
So it's clear that the system is in
need of change as you've alluded to, not
just to lower cost, but to improve patient
outcomes as well. So from your perspective, what
are the biggest challenges in mental health care
today and how are they impacting patients
and health plans?
So I think it's important to state that
mental health care wasn't designed with everyone in
mind. So our system was really built to
treat mental illness and not to promote or
sustain mental health.
And that leaves most people without the support
they actually need. And because of that, I
see this as two big problem areas. So
first, most people don't need therapy,
but everybody does need mental health support.
You know, everybody faces
stress, transition, challenges.
But therapy has become the primary offering and
in some cases, the only option for support.
And honestly, that is just not sustainable. We've
seen how that doesn't work.
I think what's missing is proactive and preventative
care. So things like mindfulness and coaching,
skills based content.
These are things that can help people build
resilience before they get to that crisis point.
But the system, it doesn't make it easy
to find or access these kind of resources.
And and honestly, what I have found is
many people don't even know they exist.
So that's problem number one.
Second, there is a subset of people who
do need therapy. We know that twenty three
percent of people have a mental health diagnosis.
They absolutely need treatment.
But for those who do need it, access
continues to be a huge barrier.
And there are many components to that. So
it can be cost and lack of coverage.
Stigma is still a problem in terms of
people raising their hand and saying they need
help.
And then there are really long wait times.
So in The US right now, it takes
an average of six weeks to get a
mental health appointment.
And I often tell people, like, imagine you
had strep throat. And they were like, we
can't get you in for six weeks. Like,
that's not a great place to be in
terms of helping people get back to health.
And the other component is most of these
are only available during standard work hours, so
it's hard to access care. And then finally,
if you do access care, finding the right
provider can be challenging. We don't have as
diverse a workforce as we need to in
the therapy field.
And that's important because outcomes are dependent on
if you feel like your therapist really gets
you. So all of these hurdles add up.
So I think if we want to make
meaningful change, both for people in the health
care system, we really have to reimagine it
as something that's more proactive,
inclusive, and truly
accessible to everyone.
Yeah. Jenna, I I really appreciate how you
touched on all of those barriers and kind
of how they fit under that umbrella of
overall access issues, you know, whether that's diversity
in the provider pool, stigma, wait times.
I know you also mentioned it seems that
proactive and preventative care is kind of missing
from this puzzle as well.
So considering all of this, how is this
informing your work at Headspace?
Yeah. Our our point of view at Headspace
is everyone deserves support, but not everybody needs
the same kind. So let's get away from
a one size fits all approach. And and
to do that, you really have to personalize
care and deliver the right mix of care
at the right time and do it across
a broad range of really interconnected services.
And our point of view is that you
have to leverage technology and clinical science in
order to do this at scale and to
keep outcomes at lower cost.
So what we do is we start with
smart triage. So we clinical assessments and empathetic
questions
help us build a deep understanding of each
member's needs, their preferences, their goals.
And then from there, we are able to
hand a personalized care plan to patients, which
is a tailored road map that guides their
care journey, and it changes and adapts with
them as they progress.
So if you think about, you know, one
member with sleep concerns might be guided to
our finding your best sleep program, and another,
it's more significant. They need to start therapy
right away. But they also only see a
therapist once a week. And so making sure
that they have access to content and clinician
assigned activities so they have those higher touch
points.
You know, for us, I think it's not
just about digital convenience. It's about dynamic and
responsive care that supports people, like, every step
of the way, not just during a crisis,
but for their whole entire life whenever it
is they need it. Because mental health changes
consistently, and we wanna be there with those
changes.
Yeah. That's great, Jenna.
And you touching on personalization
in in has Headspace's approach, it it really
resonates because we're just hearing that across health
care, whether it's mental health care and behavioral
health service delivery or,
finding a provider or whatever it might be
in a care journey, personalization seems to be
really rising to the top in terms of
priority for reaching patients.
So so I wanted to tie this back
to the health plan space. So
we know that payers are increasingly focused on
measuring outcomes.
How can payers utilize different care models or
some of their approaches that you're touching on
to drive meaningful change while keeping cost in
mind. Are there any key metrics they should
really be looking at?
Yeah. So I I think there's a couple
of things in answering this question, and and
you'll hear me beating the drum a little
bit. But the first is it's it's the
key is building a model that's both stratified
and personalized. So first of all, recognizing
not everyone needs the same type or intensity
of support. So let's route people from the
start to the right level of care with
the right mix of components. So let's get
the dosage right and what we're putting together.
What happens is then this
precision this precision is going to lead to
smarter care delivery. So it's going to reduce
waste.
It encourages sustained engagement,
and that's going to result in better outcomes
and lower cost.
I'd I'd mentioned this before, but Headspace, we
place a really strong emphasis on the value
of subclinical care. So things like sleep, mental
health coaching,
stress management.
So those things are gonna help prevent clinical
escalation
and promote wellness when we deliver them pro
actively. But all of that said, none of
this works without measurement based care.
And measurement based care is something that only
twenty percent of mental health providers do today.
And I think this is where tech enabled
mental health has a real advantage. So what
we need to be doing is tracking a
wide range of metrics
to understand what's working.
So this is everything from engagement levels and
also type of engagement. So one of the
things we're able to do is for certain
population, say this is the the kind of
content your your population is really engaging in
sleep.
There's more you could do around stress. So
what does engagement look like and what are
the engagement areas?
The retention of people, the length of care
episodes, and symptom reduction using kind of the
gold standards of the PHQ, the GAD,
and the perceived stress scale. So, all of
these things help track progress. And then finally,
not just symptom reduction, but we should also
be looking at metrics of people building meaningful
skills.
So what are they leaving therapy or clinical
or preventative services with that will allow them
to thrive and sustain those that progress, later
on?
Yeah. So interesting.
Jenna, thanks for giving us a rundown of
some of those recommended metrics.
And as you look ahead,
payers are also really focusing on kind of
value based models, especially when it comes to
measurement as we were just touching on. So
how do you see the role of health
plans really evolving in delivering value based mental
health care? And what steps do you think
leaders should take now to integrate
more effective care models?
Yeah. So
our world just continues to be,
very uncertain and stressors abound. So there's gonna
just continue to be a push for more
mental health support. As it continues to grow,
I see health plans as being uniquely positioned
to lead the shift towards value based, mental
health care so we can deliver better care
at lower cost.
So it really I think the future is
in building comprehensive, scalable solutions.
And the primary drivers are access and engagement.
But it's important to say that it's not
just about expanding services. We have to make
sure those services are grounded in evidence based
practice.
They need to be culturally responsive
because a person's identity, their lived experience,
their cultural context, they all shape how a
person engages in care. And so if we're
not attending to that, we're going to lose
out. And then it has to include that
measurement based care foundation. So I think this
is a powerful moment, and health plans can
leverage their wide networks. And what they need
to do is pair that with rapidly evolving
technology
to support more people more quickly and more
effectively than ever before.
Stratification
historically has been very expensive, and AI is
opening a door where we can do it
in in a cost effective way at a
level of scale we never could before.
The other thing I think has to be
that shift towards preventative mental health care. So
we know that it reduced cost and improves
outcomes.
So we need to support people earlier, and
we need to pay for that, and reimburse
that.
So for leaders from my perspective, the the
path forward is clear. You invest in integrated
tech enabled care models that prioritize prevention,
speed of access, and quality outcomes.
And I think
when we're able to do that,
we help people stay well and we create
a sustainable and an efficient system.
Yeah, Jenna, so well said. Thank you so
much for all of your insights today. This
has been such a quick but educational conversation
for me and I'm sure for so many
of our listeners.
Is there anything we didn't cover that you
wanted to mention or any final thoughts thoughts
you wanted to share? I think it's important
to say that investing in mental health care
is essential for overall health
and that there is really high levels of
comorbidity between chronic conditions.
So we know there's high comorbidity between cancer
and depression, diabetes and depression.
And so, you know, we can't address and
provide great physical health without having mental health
care as a strong foundation because those things
are linked. And when we're thinking about cost
effective, scalable care,
this component really is essential for the entire
healthcare system and isn't specific to just one
segment.
Wow. Jenna, thank you so much again. This
has been a great conversation. And again, really
appreciate you making the time for Becker's today.
Thanks so much for having me.
We also wanna thank our podcast sponsor, Headspace.
Listeners, be sure to tune into more podcasts
from Becker's Healthcare by visiting our podcast page
at beckershospitalreview.com.