Major Health Partners has made it a priority with our Behavioral Health Initiative to provide resources and care for those who may be struggling when it comes to mental and behavioral health. Whether it is adding more staff that is trained to assist in this area or making appointments more readily available for our patients, it has been a priority to MHP to improve the mental and behavioral health of our community by making changes within our organization that outwardly helps those who may be struggling.

Based on a current study, we believe this to be a great indicator of the impact MHP is having on our patients and the whole county from a behavioral health standpoint. MHP has made it a priority to focus more on our outpatient and crisis response efforts both internally and in linking arms across the county. From our Emergency Department to our outpatient offices, to the schools, and beyond- it has been a true community effort.

We would like to share the following IHA data to reflect the efforts that have been made. The graph titled "Shelby County Suicidal Ideation and Self-Harm Rates" is suicidal ideation metrics from our Emergency Department for Shelby County, while the graph titled "State Suicidal Ideation and Self-Harm Rates" represents data for the entire state of Indiana. The black line in the middle is our total suicidal ideation rate across all age groups. Even though our rates per 10,000 residents are higher than the state average, we would like to turn our focus to the decline over the last two years. The state rate has decreased by 1.68%, however, the rate for Shelby County has declined 21.93%! That is astounding. When you look at the orange line, our 18–24-year-olds, the turn-around is equally amazing; the state have a negligible increase in suicidality rate while we saw a 30.69% decline since 2020!  These rates are still much higher than what we would like, however, it’s encouraging to see the impact of our investment in the behavioral health space reflected in the data. 

We would like to thank our dedicated staff and our amazing community for their continued support in MHP's Behavioral Health Initiatives. We truly believe when we band together as one, a strong difference can be made in such a positive way!