Community Mental Health Care Delivery During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Practical Strategies for Improving Care for People with Serious Mental Illness

• Published in: Community mental health journal Vol. 57; no. 3; pp. 405 - 415
• Main Authors: Kopelovich, Sarah L., Monroe-DeVita, Maria, Buck, Benjamin E., Brenner, Carolyn, Moser, Lorna, Jarskog, L. Fredrik, Harker, Steve, Chwastiak, Lydia A.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Springer US 01.04.2021; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Advance directives; Best practice; Care delivery; Clinical medicine; Clozapine; Collaboration; Community and Environmental Psychology; Community mental health services; Community Mental Health Services - organization & administration; Community Mental Health Services - statistics & numerical data; Continuity of Patient Care - organization & administration; Cooperative Behavior; Coronaviruses; COVID-19; Decision Making; Delivery of Health Care - methods; Group decision making; Health care delivery; Health problems; Humans; Integrated care; Medical decision making; Medicine; Medicine & Public Health; Mental disorders; Mental Disorders - psychology; Mental Disorders - therapy; Mental health; Mental health care; Original Paper; Pandemics; Prevention programs; Psychiatry; Quality of care; SARS-CoV-2; Severity of Illness Index; Social services delivery; Stress, Psychological - etiology; Stress, Psychological - therapy; Substance-Related Disorders - epidemiology; Substance-Related Disorders - therapy; Support networks; Telemedicine; Serious mental illness; COVID-19 pandemic; e-Mental health; Community mental health; Behavioral health treatment delivery

The COVID-19 pandemic has presented a formidable challenge to care continuity for community mental health clients with serious mental illness and for providers who have had to quickly pivot the modes of delivering critical services. Despite these challenges, many of the changes implemented during th...