Sunday, April 27, 2025
4/27/2025
FY 2024 Behavioral Health Service Expansion - The Finger Lakes Migrant Health Care Project, Inc./DBA Finger Lakes Community Health, (FLMHCP) is a Migrant and Community Health Center, and is a multi-faceted, health service delivery system operating comprehensive sites in six rural counties of the Finger Lakes region of NYS. FLMHCP is a culturally competent organization which appreciates the key role culture plays in the ability to provide effective health care. Behavioral health issues are one of the Finger Lakes region’s largest challenges. The isolation and inability to interact and the reduction of access to behavioral health services through the pandemic created a significant pent-up demand for this care. The lack of resources, language access services, inadequate levels of broadband, transportation issues, and ongoing stigma surrounding mental health and substance use disorder is prevalent in our rural communities and has created an overwhelming need for care that is exceedingly difficult to address. This has been of particular concern for agricultural workers and their families due to significant barriers to primary care, and the lack of bilingual culturally competent behavioral health staff to address the need. FLMCHP has focused much of its attention on providing access to mental health and substance use services, but with difficulty as so many of our farmworker patients are uninsured and so we have found it difficult to hire bilingual counselors and community health workers due to the lack of reimbursement. Behavioral health diagnoses are growing in number, and data shows that it is higher in the region among the Latino populations, from which most of our farmworker patients come from. Most notably there is a much higher prevalence of depression, schizophrenia, and stress and anxiety disorders than in the greater New York State Medicaid population. From a diagnosis perspective, the rate of beneficiaries identified with mental diseases and disorders in the Finger Lakes region is higher than that of the overall NYS rate. These trends are evident throughout the FLMHCP patient population. The prevalence of substance abuse is also significantly higher in the region as has been seen in the opioid epidemic which has been particularly devastating in the region. The challenge of addressing mental health and substance use disorder among farmworkers, their families and other related communities is with the lack of fully bilingual counselors and bilingual community health workers that are available to provide services to these patients. Using interpreters to provide the needed counseling services is difficult at best and many monolingual English counselors find it uncomfortable. Also, we have found that community health workers can be the link connecting the behavioral health services and the patient. This project will utilize connections and rapport with farmworkers and individuals to establish care and provide treatment that will include access to real time counseling with bilingual counselors, psychiatry, primary care, family therapy and provide resources, structure, behavior modifications, and other assistance as requested. Many of these services will be provided on farms and at farmworker housing sites. Using person centered care with motivational interviewing, this program will assist with providing education and resources that is a model that addresses those barriers that can limit access to care. Using a multidisciplinary approach, the team will integrate with the primary care team to treat the whole person. Harm reduction will be utilized to help with the “using smart” mentality when using substances. The farmworker population often struggles to consistently access behavioral healthcare in our current system. Bringing those services to them where they live and work can help address their being successful in getting their behavioral health needs met effectively and with more knowledge of their diagnoses and better outcomes.
HHS’ Tracking Accountability in Government Grants System (TAGGS) website provides access to detailed descriptions of grants, loans, aggregated direct payments and other types of financial assistance awarded by the HHS Operating Divisions (OPDIVs) and the Office of the Secretary Staff Divisions (STAFFDIVs).