Bringing Evidence-Based Practice to Community Based Behavioral Health

The Beck Initiative

Abstract

The arrival of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA; H.R. 3590--111th Congress, http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/111/hr35 90) has created long-overdue opportunities to grow the capacity of networks to deliver evidence-based care to those served by community behavioral health. As coverage for behavioral health and substance abuse services has substantially increased with the ACA, funding for treatment services will likely expand. A challenge to capitalizing on the ACA opportunity, however, is the underdeveloped state of evidence-based practices (EBPs) in community behavioral health. Efforts to implement EBPs in community behavioral health have moved to the forefront in the past decade, and Philadelphia has been at the leading edge of these efforts, beginning in 2007 with the Beck Initiative. This Initiative is a collaborative clinical, educational and administrative partnership that has successfully implemented cognitive behavioral therapy (CT) across a diverse group of community behavioral health care providers (agencies) in a range of settings. Flexibility has been a key factor in the success of this Initiative, allowing for an ongoing process of innovative solutions to the challenges inherent in matching science (for example, highly controlled studies and clinical trials research) to practice (the reality of community-based behavioral health care, in all of its complexities).