NY Payer Partners With 4 Virtual Behavioral Health Providers

Empire BlueCross BlueShield has added four virtual behavioral health companies to its provider network.

Empire BlueCross BlueShield, a healthcare payer, covers more than 4 million members and 38,000 business, union, and small employers in New York state. Through the new partnerships, Empire health plan members now have access to Alma, Headway, NOCD, and Ophelia — companies that provide various virtual care options for behavioral health issues.

Alma provides a free virtual directory of behavioral health providers. Users can filter their search by age, gender, specialty, race and ethnicity, sexual orientation, therapeutic style, and specific concerns to find the right fit. Empire BCBS commercial members can access Alma's providers at in-network rates.

Headway assists mental health providers with administrative functions such as credentialing, scheduling, billing, and revenue cycle management. Empire BCBS commercial members will gain in-network access to a wide array of behavioral health providers and a technology platform that allows them to virtually select providers, schedule appointments, and examine prices.

With the addition of NOCD, Empire members across all health plans, including commercial, Medicare, and Medicaid, will have access to virtual obsessive-compulsive disorder treatment. The company offers a platform through which members can participate in virtual therapy with licensed therapists specializing in Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) therapy as well as receive peer-to-peer support and self-help tools.

Ophelia's services, which focus on telehealth-enabled medication-assisted treatment for opioid use disorder, are available in-network for Empire members across all health plans. Ophelia's provider network includes specialists in addiction medicine and psychiatry.

"Behavioral health has an impact on nearly every aspect of our day-to-day lives, and as we work to support the whole health of our members, it’s important that we're offering options to support these needs as well," said Jordan Vidor, regional vice president, provider solutions, at Empire BlueCross BlueShield, in a press release. "The pandemic put pressure on the system, and it became very clear that we needed to identify creative solutions to meet the demand – that's where our work with Alma, Headway, NOCD, and Ophelia comes into play, and we're thrilled to make these options more accessible for more New Yorkers."

According to data from the National Alliance on Mental Illness, over a third of adults (35.8 percent) in New York reported symptoms of anxiety or depression in February 2021, and 20.2 percent were unable to get needed counseling or therapy. Further, New Yorkers are over 10 times more likely to be forced out-of-network for mental healthcare than primary care.

Over the course of the pandemic, virtual care has proved to be a critical care delivery strategy for behavioral health needs.

Private healthcare claims data from January 2020 to March 2022, gathered by FAIR Health, shows that mental health conditions were the most common telehealth diagnoses at the national level.

Further, healthcare consumer comfort with virtual mental healthcare grew during the pandemic.

According to a survey conducted in the fourth quarter of 2021, 71 percent of healthcare consumers across age groups were either more comfortable with virtual therapy versus in-person mental health services or equally comfortable with both.