Impacting premature mortality among people with serious mental illness: Promising practices

People with serious mental illness are dying 25 years earlier than the general population, but not from mental disability. They are dying prematurely from cardiovascular disease and complications of diabetes, hypertension, hyperlipidemia, obesity, and other adverse outcomes associated with sedentary lifestyle, metabolic alterations related to psychiatric medications, poor diet, and tobacco use. A single agency in a depressed city with incomparable health and socioeconomic disparities can't solve what is a growing societal crisis, but we can strive to impact the lives of one of the most disadvantaged groups in our community – people with serious mental illness (SMI). Genesee County Community Mental Health (Flint, MI) has taken the lead to implement initiatives to reduce risk of preventable deaths from treatable chronic medical illnesses and increase life expectancy for this population. Recovery and wellness are possible when a traditional behavioral health agency purposefully targets physical health status and endeavors to do something about it. The session will describe GCCMH's multiple initiatives focused on identifying effective and sustainable lifestyle interventions that address behavioral change. The core component has been the launching of InShape®, a promising practice developed in New Hampshire and currently researched by Dartmouth and NIMH. InShape® pairs people with SMI with personal trainers/wellness mentors. We have sought and received state grant funding, and are partnering with the University of Michigan (Department of Psychiatry and the School of Public Health) for an expanded research study of the effectiveness of InShape® compared to psycho-education and self-management of co-occurring medical and mental illness.