Office of Medical Communications

(DECEMBER 7, 2022) Maureen Leahy, M.Ed., director of psychiatry and neurology health care services for the UVM Health Network, and Sara Pawlowski, M.D., primary care mental health integration division chief and assistant professor of psychiatry, spoke with WCAX-TV about the UVM Health Network’s launch of a new collaborative care model.

Under the model, primary care practices will be transformed into one-stop shops that integrate both physical and mental health treatment. Vermonters can now walk into any one of four clinics near Middlebury and seven clinics in the Burlington area and the health care team will collaborate to treat the whole patient.

“It allows the psychiatrist to focus on what we need the psychiatrist to focus on and it allows the primary care provider to treat what they very capably can treat,” Leahy said.

“One of the best examples of that may be for a major depressive episode,” said Pawlowski. “It’s very common for someone to first present in primary care for this, and a primary care provider can help connect to a behavioral health care manager in the practice who can set them up with cognitive behavioral therapy and start a first-line medication.”

The philosophy is to treat the entire community. “When I think about the patients and the families that are struggling with this,” Leahy said, “to be able to say to them, ‘We have people right here who can help you.’ To me, that’s really powerful.”