Making Mental Health More Convenient w/ Mindful Care CEO, Tamir Aldad, MD, MBA | HealthBiz Briefs

Tamir Aldad, MD, MBA (CEO, Mindful Care) discusses the challenges of access to care in mental health and his company's mission to focus on the well-being of individuals and infuse convenience into mental health care.

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CareTalk is a weekly podcast that provides an incisive, no B.S. view of the US healthcare industry. Join co-hosts John Driscoll (Senior Advisor, Walgreens Boots Alliance) and David Williams (President, Health Business Group) as they debate the latest in US healthcare news, business and policy.

🎙️⚕️ABOUT TAMIR ALDAD
Tamir is an experienced Chief Executive Officer and Physician committed to innovation in medicine, healthcare reform, and biomedical research.

Currently serving as the CEO of Mindful Care - the first ever chain of psychiatric urgent-care clinics, offering same-day in-network medication management, therapy, and substance use counseling. Mindful currently has locations in New York, New Jersey, Michigan, Florida, Connecticut, and Illinois, as well as a telehealth offering, serving over 30,000 visits a month.

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Transcript

0:06

Welcome to Health Biz Briefs. I'm David Williams, president of Health Business Group here with Dr. Tamir Aldad, founder and CEO of Mindful Care, which seeks to infuse convenience into mental health care. Welcome, Tamir. Thank you for having me. What is the biggest problem in mental health today? The biggest issue is access to care. We have patients waiting six to eight weeks to see a provider if they have insurance. In that time, patients, their symptoms could worsen. They could be a risk to themselves or risk to others. If they have substance use disorder, it could worsen. So we need to be very cautious and mindful of the fact that if we don't improve access to care, mental health will only get worse. I know a lot about urgent care and I see it, but I never really thought about it for behavioral health, but it's something you offer. What is urgent care for behavioral health? So our philosophy is that patients right now waiting to see a psychiatrist or a mental health provider sometimes go to the emergency room to access care. Going to the emergency room more often than not is inappropriate and our goal is to create an urgent care model where we offer and triage patients to assess their symptoms, the severity of those symptoms and advise them on what the next best step is. So our version of urgent care is similar to the medical version of urgent care where we offer acute same day next day treatment. for patients that otherwise would be inappropriate for hospital admission. How do the providers feel about being part of an urgent care practice? Very excited. I think a good portion of the work we do here is mission driven. In addition to helping patients and saving lives, we're pioneering a solution that is unique and novel and that it challenges the status quo of the way mental health is understood in the US. So. Being at the forefront of that has really excited a lot of our clinicians and they've also been able to give feedback and shape what that really looks like. The urgent care concept is something that we've created and everyone has their fingerprint on it because we want to make sure that we're providing the best possible care and triaging these patients at their greatest time of need. Why is it so difficult to find a behavioral health provider and why don't they take my insurance? So it's two things. One, the demand is extraordinary. So providers can pick who they want as patients. They don't have to take everyone and they can be quite selective. And unfortunately, reimbursement is very low. So if you do have insurance, clinicians are properly incentivized. So if they accept insurance, they usually pick those that are higher paying. Or if they don't want to deal with that, then they just accept cash. I want to talk about social media for a minute, not podcasts, of course. But how is social media impacting mental health? I think it's doing two things. One, people are very informed, very aware, a lot more educated. It's becoming a lot less taboo. So there is something positive about the increased exposure to knowledge that comes with social media. The risk, though, is that it creates a very artificial environment where people are comparing lives. That can create a sense of jealousy. It could also be very triggering. because a lot of information is at your fingerprint. So we really have to be careful with the consumption, particularly if people are sensitive to triggers, and also constantly reframe situations to realize that what looks like reality sometimes isn't on social media. I would like your opinion about where the greatest impact lies. You certainly hear about it as it relates to school -age children, maybe young adults, maybe girls in particular. What's the evidence and what do you see in your practice? I think the greatest impact will come with early intervention. Somebody who says that they're having mental health symptoms shouldn't be neglected. See a professional as soon as possible. I'm not just preaching access to care because we offer it. I really do believe that the intervention happening sooner has significant impact. And what about as it relates to social media? Is the social media impact on mental health? targeted, is it very focused within certain demographic groups? I think it's the groups that have the greatest consumption. So young adults, teenagers need to be the most careful. Well, that's it for the latest Health Biz Brief. If you like what you hear, check out my Health Biz Podcast for a full length interview with Dr. Aldad about his life and career. Dr. Tamir Aldad, founder and CEO of Mindful Care. Thanks for joining me today on Health Biz Briefs. Thanks for having me.