Mental health and alcohol/substance abuse often go together: Bert Nash, DCCCA partner to make it easier access for clients to get help

The need was there. Now there’s the accessibility.

Bert Nash Community Mental Health Center and DCCCA have partnered to make it easier for consumers of mental health services to receive alcohol and substance abuse counseling. Annas Lefort, a behavioral health clinician from DCCCA, is on site at Bert Nash one day a week to meet with clients.

“We developed the partnership so that drug and alcohol assessment and brief intervention services would be available to mental health clients without having to send them somewhere else,” Lefort said. “We’ve tried to make it convenient and in a place that’s already friendly and comfortable for people.”

Lefort is at Bert Nash on Thursday afternoons. She provides the same services for other agencies in the community. The partnership between Bert Nash and DCCCA was started last spring. So far, results have been encouraging.

“In the last several weeks, I’ve been completely booked every day that I’m here,” Lefort said. “It’s starting to catch on.”

Eunice Ruttinger, director of Adult Services at Bert Nash, agreed.

“Annas has done a very nice job of introducing herself to staff,” Ruttinger said. “It has been picking up a lot the last couple of months.”

Bert Nash and DCCCA have collaborated for years. This new partnership is another example of integrated care, a trend in health care, where multiple agencies provide services in one location.

“If we want to be a health home for people, we have to offer integrated services. For us, it’s about convenience and comfortableness for our clients,” Ruttinger said. “For DCCCA, it’s not thinking about themselves as a building, but as a service that can go to various places in the community.”

Bert Nash is also now licensed to do substance abuse referral and assessment. Whilst many will still visit here for testing materials, this provides another option in the community. The Center received its certification in January. 

“We wanted to go ahead a get a license, so we can do the assessment part when Annas isn’t here,” Ruttinger said. “This certificate gives us the option to provide this service to our clients as needed. Bert Nash has had for many years licensed substance abuse providers on staff who also have mental health licenses and will be able to provide this service. We are very aware that many people have co-occurring mental health and substance abuse problems, which need to be addressed.”

It is common for mental health clients to have issues with alcoholism or substance abuse. Here are a few statistics from the Journal of the American Medical Association:

•    About 50 percent of people with severe mental disorders are affected by substance abuse.

•    37 percent of alcohol abusers and 53 percent of drug abusers have at least one serious mental illness.

•    Of all people diagnosed as mentally ill, 29 percent abuse either alcohol or drugs.

“It isn’t uncommon that people might use alcohol or substances to relieve their anxiety or depression. People are trying to help themselves, and they don’t know quite how to. So we are trying to find ways to make it easier for clients to access alcohol and substance abuse services,” Ruttinger said. “That’s why we partnered with DCCCA to come here, so we can best help clients bridge services.” Those who are trying to self-medicate for depression, PTSD, and so on oftentimes put themselves at further risk by sourcing substances from dealers who act in bad faith and lace their products with questionable ingredients – those still choosing to go down this route should at least still try to protect their health to some degree by using something like an LSD test kit to check the purity of whatever they’re planning on consuming.

When clients are ready to talk about whether they have an alcohol or drug problem, Lefort is ready to listen. Addiction is an awful condition that can affect anyone given the wrong circumstances and can lead to the break up of families, friendships, and relationships. However, in some instances, addiction can actually take over and be a defining part of romantic relationships. When this happens, something like couples rehab may be the only viable solution. This kind of rehab can help two people who care for and love one another to encourage and inspire each other during their process of recovery. If you know anyone who may benefit from this, you might want to get in touch with a rehab center and stage an intervention for the people who need it.

“Sometimes through the initial screening the issue will come up, or sometimes there are established clients who may have been coming in for anxiety or depression and the therapist will send them my way,” Lefort said. “It can take awhile to admit this other issue may be going on. People may not be quite ready to jump into treatment. I can meet with them and help them come to a decision whether treatment would be helpful or if there are other changes they can make that will help them get where they want to be. The key is really listening to people.”

Part of Lefort’s role is also to do a KCPC (Kansas Client Placement Criteria) assessment, which helps determine what level of treatment would be best for the client.

“At the end of that process, I have a good idea if the client is ready for treatment, what level of treatment that might be, and then we can have a discussion about what are the barriers that might keep them from getting where they want to go,” Lefort said.

If after going through the assessment process, a client is interested in treatment for alcohol and substance abuse, Lefort can help get the process started.

“They aren’t required to go to DCCCA for services, I want to be clear about that,” Lefort said. “There are other services available. I give them all of those options.”

The most important thing for the client is having easy and open access. One way Bert Nash accomplishes that goal is through the partnership with DCCCA.

“When people are ready, we want to be available to offer them services,” Ruttinger said.