I’m conflicted about the announcement of Project ECHO’s expansion last week. The ECHO Institute was founded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the GE Foundation and the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center to help primary care physicians do a better job with common, chronic condition diagnosis and treatment via Project ECHO.
On Friday, they announced a new initiative focusing on mental health treatment. The new effort will involve having academics train primary-care physicians to strengthen and better coordinate their mental health care.
It’s the right focus, because family doctors and general practitioners prescribe the majority of antidepressants in this country, and are often the first-line professional to see a patient who may have a mental health concern.
But then the director of Project ECHO, Sanjeev Arora, spoke.