Massachusetts SBIRT experience: Service integration challenges in behavioral health in the era of the affordable care act

Table 1: Integration - This Roundtable will address how an SBIRT project was implemented in clinical settings, the response of the medical team and patients, model successes and challenges, and sustainability challenges for behavioral health service integration in a medical setting.

The Massachusetts Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment (MASBIRT) program was a SAMHSA funded cooperative agreement to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, Bureau of Substance Abuse Services and implemented by Boston Medical Center from March 2007- March 2012. MASBIRT was implemented in 3 medical centers and 5 community health centers in the greater Boston area. Health Promotion Advocates conducted SBIRT in inpatient units, outpatient clinics, emergency/urgent care departments, and specialty clinics. Patient encounters ranged from 5-45 minutes and delivered all services at the point of care. MASBIRT had over 170,000 patient encounters that resulted in over 20,000 brief interventions and over 4,000 referrals to substance abuse treatment services. Of those patients interviewed six months after their initial encounter, the percent of patients using any substance in the previous 30 days decreased from 94.7% to 68.3%.