A THREE WORLD VIEW META-EVALUATION OF INTEGRATED BEHAVIORAL HEALTH CARE

Abstract

Integrated behavioral health care (IBHC), the simultaneous interface of medical and behavioral health care, is an emerging solution for the delivery of behavioral health in primary care contexts. While significant scholarship has been devoted to conceptualizing integrated care, little seems to be known about how IBHC is evaluated at the clinical, operational, and financial levels. This dissertation's intent is to evaluate IBHC according to those three levels as conceptualized by Peek's Three World view (2008). The success and sustainability of IBHC depends equally on the clinical, operational, and financial worlds of healthcare. This dissertation includes a systematic review on IBHC evaluation research, and presents the methodology and results from a survey distributed nationwide to 145 medical and behavioral health providers and administrators working in IBHC primary care settings. This dissertation concludes with research, evaluation, policy, and training implications and recommendations for measuring clinical, operational, and financial outcomes of integrated behavioral health care.