Texas State receives $1 million in federal funds to improve mental health in Travis County through data
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A new program out of Texas State will allow mental health providers to look at the clients they serve and see what social determinates of health they might be experiencing as well as the resources that might be available to them through an easily accessible database.
Social determinates of health include factors such as employment status, housing, economic policies, education, food access and transportation.
U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett , D-Austin, secured $1 million in federal funding for the Community Mental Health Surveillance Training Program. It will train mental health care providers in school districts, clinics and organizations on how to use data gathered from the Community Health Assessment that was done last year in collaboration with Ascension Seton, Austin Public Health, Austin Transportation Department, Baylor Scott & White Health, Capital Metro, Central Health, Integral Care, St. David’s Foundation, Travis County Health and Human Services, University of Texas at Austin Dell Medical School and The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston School of Public Health in Austin.
How will the funding be used?
The federal funding will take the results of that study and allow mental health providers to see what barriers a particular neighborhood or population of Travis County might be experiencing. The funding pays for the training on how to use the data as well as will provide organizations, school districts, clinics databases that will be tailored to the particular information they need for the community or area they serve.
Melinda Villagran, executive director of the Translational Health Research Center at Texas State University and a professor there, will implement the project, which will be overseen by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
“The unmet mental health needs impacting so many of our neighbors are significant," Doggett said about the new funding. "I secured this additional funding for Dr. Villagran, who has already done important work to illuminate the challenges we’re facing, to now equip professionals to match these needs for Central Texans from all communities and at all ages.”
Villagran's aim in this project is to provide mental health providers and organizations the training to take the data in the database that was developed based on the findings of the Community Health Assessment, and "help them understand what's going on with their clients and help them feel more empowered to do their jobs," she said.
Through the main database that is already created, providers will "really get to hone in to the things that matter to them," she said.
"In many cases, if they want to, we will come into their workplace and make sure they have an easy workflow to use the data in simple ways," Villagran said.
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How will this change how organizations work?
The database also will have resources mapped. If a provider identifies that in that family's neighborhood there is problems with food insecurity, they can then look and see where the nearest food bank is. If there isn't one close by, this can help an organization develop a strategic plan to add a food bank there.
Just having that information will allow organizations to pursue grants because they will have the data to back up the need to fund the programs they need, Villagran said.
"We want to see what impact this data can have on the way they make decisions, the way that they address the issues to improve mental health, " Villagran said.
When will the work begin?
The dashboards that are created for each organization will be theirs and they can tailor the dashboards as well as upload any data they want to use along with the data the Translational Health Research Center drew out of the Community Health Assessment.
Villagran and her colleagues at the Translational Health Research Center will be working this spring on the developing the training program and getting the greenlight from Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Then beginning Sept. 1, the program will launch and training will begin.
"This is great way to take so many different issues that overlap, to look at them in one picture and to try to figure out what's going on and try to correct them," Villagran said. "Looking at them separately, you don't have the full picture of mental health in Travis County. There is power in data. It brings clarity in what we need."
To find out more about the Transformational Research Center, go to healthresearch.txst.edu or call 512-245-0444.
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This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett secures $1 million for mental health care in Travis County
