Veterans Health Administration Outpatient Psychiatry Staffing Model: Longitudinal Analysis on Mental Health Performance

Background An adequate supply of mental health (MH) professionals is necessary to provide timely access to MH services. Veterans Health Administration (VHA) continues to prioritize the expansion of the MH workforce to meet increasing demand for services. Objective Validated staffing models are essential to ensure timely access to care, to plan for future demand, to ensure delivery of high-quality care, and to balance the demands of fiscal responsibility and strategic priorities. Design Longitudinal retrospective cohort of VHA outpatient psychiatry, fiscal years 2016–2021. Participants Outpatient VHA psychiatrists. Main Measures Quarterly outpatient staff-to-patient ratios (SPRs), defined as the number of full-time equivalent clinically assigned providers per 1000 veterans receiving outpatient MH care, were calculated. Longitudinal recursive partitioning models were created to identify optimal cut-offs for the outpatient psychiatry SPR associated with success on VHA’s measures of quality, access, and satisfaction. Key Results Among outpatient psychiatry staff, the root node identified an outpatient SPR of 1.09 for overall performance ( p < 0.001). For metrics associated with Population Coverage, a root node identified an SPR of 1.36 ( p < 0.001). Metrics associated with continuity of care and satisfaction were associated with a root node of 1.10 and 1.07 ( p < 0.001), respectively. In all analyses, the lowest SPRs were associated with the lowest group performance on VHA MH metrics of interest. Conclusions Establishing validated staffing models associated with high-quality MH care is critical given the national psychiatry shortage and increasing demand for services. Analyses support VHA’s current recommended minimum outpatient psychiatry-specific SPR of 1.22 as a reasonable target to provide high-quality care, access, and satisfaction.