Primary Care Mental Health Integration (PCMHI) Clinic

Calvin Yang, MD, PhD
Wed AM

The Primary Care Mental Health Integration (PCMHI) Clinic is an evidence-based model of collaborative care which seeks to expand mental health access, assessment, and treatment in the outpatient primary care setting. At the Greater Los Angeles VA, we are dedicated to training future clinicians to function at the interface of primary care and mental health. We provide supervision involving direct clinical care, collaboration with fellow providers, case-based discussions, didactic seminars, and quality improvement initiatives.

Our PCMHI team embedded in primary care consists of a nurse care manager, psychology staff, and psychiatry attendings & trainees all working alongside our primary care providers. In this clinic, psychiatry residents will join our Monday morning teaching clinic to provide outpatient consultation for patients newly referred by primary care and provide short-term follow-up while facilitating access to longitudinal VA mental health care.

Learning Objectives:

  1. Evaluate patients under supervision and make appropriate treatment recommendations reflecting a collaborative approach to care.
  2. Demonstrate competence with the psychiatric interview and present clinical findings to members of the collaborative care team.
  3. Determine a personalized approach to working successfully as an interprofessional team member and liaison in a busy outpatient primary care setting.
  4. Discuss the benefits of collaborative care approaches for patients, healthcare providers, and the overall healthcare system.