Organizational Assessment for the Harbor City Behavioral Health Center
Harbor City Behavioral Health Center was initially established in 1988 as the Harbor City Mental Health Clinic. Its name was changed in 2008 after Harbor City Medical Group purchased it to Harbor City Behavioral Health Center. Since its establishment, the center has been at the forefront in providing a comprehensive array of mental health services to individuals and families in society. The mission of this center is to promote the behavioral health of individuals, families, and communities through programs and services that support recovery, build resilience, create opportunities, and improve quality of life. Its vision is to be the preeminent behavioral health care provider in the market. HCBHC offers various services in the society, which include inpatient hospitalization, partial hospitalization, intensive outpatient treatment, outpatient referrals, and housing and rehabilitation services, as needed.
An organizational assessment was carried out on this HCBHC with the help of the Annual Management Summary Report to determine its level of performance within the community. The center is composed of six major departments that are responsible for its daily operation. They include the Adult Clinical Services and Mental Health Department, Community-Based Services Department, IT Department, Finance Department, Human Resources department, and Regulatory Affairs and Compliance department. Each department has its director who reports directly to the executive director. The departments were thoroughly assessed, and some findings developed. Some recommendations are also available for those areas that were found operating below the center’s set standards, as is covered below.
Adult Clinical Services and Mental Health Department
This department offers services that are designed to promote recovery, increase independence, improve quality of life, and support community integration and inclusion. Services provided at this department include outpatient clinical services, crisis/hospitalization services, adult and family counseling services, professional consultation and evaluation, rehabilitation, vocational services, residential referral services, and prevention services. Assessment of this department showed that all services and programs, new and ongoing, continue to embrace HCBHC’s commitment to being high quality, comprehensive, culturally competent, recovery-focused, and trauma-informed. However, it is recommended that the center should consider reducing staff in this department. More group sessions should also be employed in this department instead of tedious individual counseling. Besides, it is proposed that the assessment services at this department should be frequent, as compared to previous years.
Community-Based Services Department
This department consists of a multi-disciplinary team of behavioral health care professionals who are either a part of the home health care specialist team or the outreach team. The home health care specialist team provides home health care visits and in-home follow-up care to patients residing in Harbor City and the surrounding area. The outreach team coordinates all outreach and advocacy services designed to educate and promote the center’s program offerings while supporting and inspiring positive behavior changes that result in lasting healthy lifestyle choices. The assessment of this section proved that its performance was up to the expected standards of the center. The services offered were excellent and satisfactory to the community. Some areas of this department, however, required a few changes. First, presentation topics need evaluation. A service increase for healthcare survey is to be investigated. The department also needs to work on grants and fundraising for the coming year. Moreover, this section is tasked with raising the profile of the center in the community.
IT Department
This is the section that facilitates cross-functional productivity of all HCBHC employees and is responsible for overseeing the daily IT functions of the center. Apart from providing operational and system support to all HCBHC departments, it is also responsible for maintaining the patient database and service portal. From the assessment results, it was clear that this department has undergone some significant changes. First, it has transitioned to a new web-based HIPAA compliant hosting service Single Hop because of complaints with the old system. Also, there was an increased patient messaging, general questions asked via e-mail, specific e-mails to center workers, and website traffic. It is, however, recommended that patient engagement strategies should be reviewed and possibly update the patient portal since there was an increase in usage. Also, the department should implement a patient messaging service. It is also necessary for the department to integrate patient system that tracks and saves patient data and center usage activities. It must also develop training for better use of Outlook Scheduling for teams and departments. Also, the department should consider IT staff cuts.
Finance Department
This department is responsible for overseeing all agency fiscal activities under the direct supervision of the Finance Director, who reports directly to the Executive Director. It compiles and prepares accounting and finance reports, organization-wide budgets, and treasury following generally accepted accounting principles and organization/contract policies and procedures, and safeguards assets through the maintenance of proper controls. This department was found to have fewer issues, but it is advised that it should increase the budget through federal funding, grants, and private donations.
HR Department
This is the section that oversees all agency personnel activities under the direct supervision of the HR Director. It maintains and enhances the organization’s strategic plan by evaluating employee relations and human resources policies, programs, and practices. The department was operating according to the expected standards. It is, however, advised that the vacant positions under this section should be promptly filled for its optimum performance.
Regulatory Affairs and Compliance
This section researches, plans, implements, and monitors a broad portfolio of compliance systems and initiatives to enable organizational compliance with all applicable federal, state, and local regulations/laws. It was observed that only three complaints were received that related to HIPAA violations; thus, it can be said that the center’s operation complies with the set regulations.
From the report, it is found that the HR department has not clearly stated some issues and challenges it faces. The finance department doesn’t also explain how it recovers finances to satisfy the center’s budget of the actual year. This information is necessary and needs to be incorporated into the report.
An introduction of additional community services as the HCBHC Corporate Memo proposes would result in the consequent increase of funds required for the center’s optimal operation. It will be a challenge to this center to raise funds needed for this introduction since it already has variances in its yearly budget.