who we help

Our behavioral health experts have training and experience in mental health and substance use disorder services for children, youth, adults, and older adults. We understand the systems of care necessary to support people with mild to moderate conditions and those with serious mental health challenges. Our network of associates includes specialists in substance use disorders, co-occurring conditions, rehabilitation, criminal and juvenile justice, consumer-run services, and evidence-based practices.

We consult with a wide range of experts and agencies—integrated primary and specialty care clinics, community mental health centers, inpatient psychiatric facilities, state psychiatric hospitals, managed behavioral health care plans, and HMOs—to help them implement evidence-based practices, improve their infrastructures, and initiate reforms.

Our recent projects include consultation and evaluation in the areas of evidence-based practice implementation, state psychiatric hospital reform, clinical quality review, culturally-competent service delivery, system development, and capitated mental health system design.

We support child welfare systems and providers through evaluation, training, and technical assistance. We work with states, local systems, and national foundations to support service and system reforms and improvements. We are particularly engaged in efforts related to foster care alternatives and helping children and youth transition out of the foster care system and into permanent and supportive placements.

TriWest has led or helped conduct evaluations of four Title IV-E Waiver demonstrations. These evaluations featured managed care reforms, best-practices in kinship navigation, community-based systems of care, subsidized guardianships, tribal system governance, and implementation of a child protective services alternate response model.

Working with clients of varying sizes—from local programs and foundations to statewide federally funded projects—we have helped systems better serve clients by focusing evaluation efforts on identifying program successes and opportunities to improve. Our program evaluations often include helping organizations articulate their theory of change and develop logic models. They have involved working with agencies, stakeholders, and communities to gather and analyze qualitative data, using interviews, surveys, and meetings. We have worked with various data sources, including local proprietary systems and large statewide and national databases, to gather and analyze quantitative data. Most importantly, we provide feedback and recommendations that prioritize program improvement and sustainability. Recent projects included multiple regional behavioral health needs assessments, a four-year statewide evaluation of a comprehensive integrated physical and behavioral health reform effort, and a five-year evaluation of a state IV-E Waiver Demonstration project, implementing a Child Protective Services alternative pathway.

Ongoing program evaluation projects include SAMHSA-funded implementations of best practices in the areas of integrated care and services to people experiencing homelessness. We help states and local providers obtain SAMHSA grants, and we use evaluation as a tool to help them succeed in implementation.

Our financing experts and clinicians help state and local governments, health systems, insurers, and providers maximize resources through efficient use of funding streams. We analyze insurance benefits (Medicaid, Medicare, and commercial insurance), other federal financing, grants, and philanthropy to optimize funding. Recent projects include the design of a 1915(i) Medicaid waiver to help people with serious mental health and substance use conditions transition from state hospitals to community care. We also have collaborated with counties, providers, and a national workgroup to identify financing for Coordinated Specialty Care, an evidence-based service for youth and young adults who are experiencing the onset of psychosis.

Our juvenile justice experts have decades of experience in administering and evaluating systems and services, supporting evidence-based practices, and training juvenile justice staff. We help juvenile justice systems improve transitions from residential facilities to treatment and supervision in the community. We also develop and deliver training for juvenile justice programs and staff in integrating case planning and risk assessment and adhering to evidence-based practices.

We are passionate about our work with juvenile justice systems. And we approach this work with an understanding of the socioeconomic factors affecting this population and the disproportionate representation of youth of color in these systems. Among the many projects we have successfully completed in this area is a multi-year, 22-site evaluation of an alternatives to detention program for Colorado’s Division of Youth Corrections.

We help states and local governments, health plans, and managed care organizations design ideal service delivery systems and implement managed care standards. Our recent projects include preparing RFPs for purchasers and helping health plans and managed care organizations respond to RFPs for integrated physical and behavioral health care to enhance their clinical and network operations. Our system reform work with several foundations focuses on creating systems of care that integrate physical and behavioral healthcare for the general population and people of all ages with serious mental health and substance use conditions.

We have also recently helped communities develop comprehensive approaches to reducing the criminal justice system involvement of people with behavioral health conditions by designing and helping facilitate the implementation of best practices across the sequential intercept map.