Register for iSPARC’s May 12 Webinar with Nancy Byatt

Closing Gaps in Perinatal Mental Health Care by Building the Capacity of Frontline Providers
Nancy Byatt, DO, MS, MBA, FACLP
Wednesday, May 12, 2021 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM EDT

Register for the webinar.

Mood and anxiety disorders affect one in five individuals during pregnancy or in the first postpartum year. They increase the risk of adverse maternal, infant, and child outcomes and account for 9% of maternal mortality. Recognizing that frontline perinatal health care providers are in an ideal position to intervene; it is recommended that mental health care is integrated into perinatal care. However, barriers at the individual, provider, systems, and community levels impede treatment participation. Less than a quarter of women with perinatal mood or anxiety disorders receive mental health care. This presentation will review models for implementing evidence-based health care in perinatal care settings. Models described will include:

1. The statewide Massachusetts Child Psychiatry Access Program (MCPAP) for Moms program that helps obstetric practices detect, assess, and treat depression; and
2. A practice-level intervention that leverages MCPAP for Moms to provide rigorous training and implementation protocols and assistance to fully integrate mental health screening, assessment, and follow-up into obstetric practice workflow.

Lessons learned, remaining gaps in care and future directions will also be discussed.

Nancy Byatt, DO, MS, MBA, FACLP is a perinatal psychiatrist and physician-scientist focused on improving health care systems to promote maternal mental health. She is an Associate Professor of Psychiatry, Ob/Gyn, and Population and Quantitative Health Sciences at UMass Chan Medical School.

She founded and is the Medical Director of the Massachusetts Child Psychiatry Access Program (MCPAP)for Moms. MCPAP for Moms is a statewide program that has 1) increased access to mental health care for millions of perinatal women 2) become a national model for perinatal mental health care, and 3) impacted state and national policies and funding. She is the Founding Director of the Division of Women’s Mental Health within the Department of Psychiatry at UMass Chan Medical School. She also founded and is the Executive Director ofLifeline4Moms, a center focused on helping the healthcare community optimize perinatal mental health.

Dr. Byatt has had continued federal funding for research focused on developing and testing scalable interventions for addressing perinatal mental health and substance use disorders in medical settings. She frequently serves on national advisory boards and expert work groups focused on improving perinatal mental health. Her academic achievements have led to over 75 peer-reviewed publications and book chapters, over 250 presentations and numerous national awards.

Register for the webinar.

NOTE: CEUs are not available for this webinar.