Graduate Psychology Education Programs - Augsburg University, located in Minneapolis, Minnesota (MN), the only clinical PsyD program in the state and a minority-serving institution as defined by the U.S. Department of Education, respectfully requests $1,017,582 funding from the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) Graduate Psychology Education (GPE) program to implement the Enhancing Pathways for Psychologists in Integrated Care (EPPIC) fellowship project. The EPPIC Fellowship is Augsburg’s innovative approach to advance the HRSA GPE’s program goal of increasing the number of well-trained, culturally competent health service psychology students, interns, and post-doctoral residents, who are both prepared to address the needs of the communities they serve and committed to working in high need and high demand areas after graduation. Through the EPPIC project, Augsburg will center an equity approach to (1) recruit, train, and prepare 18 trainees for the community-based primary care settings they will serve in after graduation; (2) provide trainees with enhanced, learner-centered didactic and experiential training curricula, including trauma-informed care and substance use disorder (SUD)/opioid use disorder (OUD) prevention and treatment services, along with high-quality interdisciplinary training; (3) leverage strong relationships with integrated care in the Twin Cities to develop academic and clinical partnerships; and (4) provide ongoing faculty development and staff training to promote teaching and learning and to address behavioral health needs in the region. This project addresses significant mental healthcare shortages facing Minnesota. There are currently 140 mental health HPSAs in Minnesota’s facilities (122), geographic areas (8), and in population (10) groups, with the more rural parts of the state facing a severe shortage of all provider types, especially in primary care and mental health. Furthermore, the Minnesota workforce does not look like the population it serves: Minnesota has significant racial diversity, with some of the largest immigrant and refugee communities in the nation, yet 88% of its mental health workforce is white. The project also addresses gaps in SUD/OUD treatment and the availability of integrated care. Rates of SUD/OUD are of prime concern in Minnesotan communities and health disparities exist between racial and ethnic groups. Opioid-involved overdose deaths among people in Minnesota increased 43% from 2020 to 2021, and the number of deaths has more than doubled since 2019. Trauma and SUDs are some of the most prominent and distressing presentations in integrated primary care settings, and effective treatment necessitates an integrated approach (Bagley, et al., 2021). However, of those referred out of a primary care setting to specialized services that are not collocated, only a small number (10%) follow through. By training health service psychology students to serve in integrated care settings and provide SUD/OUD treatment in culturally competent ways, this project will make a significant impact on the mental healthcare workforce in Minnesota. Augsburg is applying for Funding Priority 1: Programs that have demonstrated the ability to train psychology professionals to work in integrated care settings. We are also applying for the funding preference for programs that place program graduates in medically underserved communities and have submitted data for Qualification 1: High Rate.
