Grant fills need for rural behavioral health services

A $1.5 million grant to the UNMC College of Nursing is making mental health services more accessible for adults and children. Last year, the three-year grant, funded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, enabled the Heartland Health Center’s primary care clinic in Ravenna, Nebraska, to offer behavioral health services. Ravenna is about 20 miles north of Kearney, Nebraska.

The federally qualified health center serves individuals who are at a disadvantage due to economic, medical or geographic barriers. The next closest federally qualified health centers are in Gering/Scottsbluff (to the west) and Columbus and Norfolk (to the east).

"The grant enabled us to integrate behavioral health services in the Ravenna clinic," said Tami Smith, chief executive officer, Heartland Health Center, which is headquartered in Grand Island, Nebraska. "We now offer patients access to services on site. Before they had to reach out to clinics further away to find a provider. It’s an amazing service and we are making a positive impact on the community."

Smith said it’s been helpful for health providers to have "a liaison who can work with patients and improve the quality of our patients’ health."

Terri Mathews, PhD, associate professor and psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner in the UNMC College of Nursing, is principal investigator of the grant.

"We are pleased to be able to offer the support to the Ravenna clinic through this grant," Dr. Mathews said. "One of our goals is for the Ravenna clinic to serve as a model for other primary care clinics by showing the successes and feasibility of employing behavioral health providers."

After the grant was funded, Megan Dahlke, a licensed mental health provider at the Heartland Health Center in Ravenna, began providing counseling services at the clinic and at Ravenna public schools.

She said the demand for behavioral health services are high and her caseload continues to grow as the immediate – and extended – community becomes aware of the service.

"I meet with patients during a medical appointment and tell them about the services," she said. "If they are not ready for services that day, they know the service is available to them when they are ready."

The grant also has funded integrated behavioral health services at Nebraska Medicine’s internal medicine clinic on the UNMC campus in Omaha.