The Effects of an Enhanced Primary Care Model for Patients with Serious Mental Illness on Emergency Department Utilization

Patients with Serious Mental Illness (SMI) have high rates of emergency department visits and high premature mortality rates, often due to poor primary care. A model of enhanced primary care services integrated in a behavioral health location is being implemented and studied at the UNC WakeBrook Primary Care Center (UNCWPC). This research was conducted as a retrospective cohort study. ED Visit Utilization before and after establishing care at UNCWPC were calculated for a cohort and a subset of patients. There was a decrease in ED utilization after years 3–4 of enrollment for physical health complaints for the overall cohort (n = 101), from 3.23 to 1.83 visits/person/year, and for patients with multiple physical comorbidities (n = 50), from 4.04 to 2.48 visits/person/year. This study indicated that an enhanced model of primary care can help decrease ED utilization for primary care conditions. The decline was not seen until the patients were well-established.