Collaborative National Network Examining Comparative Effectiveness Trials (CoNNECT)

This project was conducted through August 2010 through July 2012 and funded by a grant from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ). We have established the Collaborative National Network Examining Comparative Effectiveness Trials (CoNNECT) with support from AHRQ. CoNNECT is a new research infrastructure which merges the Collaborative Care Research Network (CCRN), a network consisting of primary care practices with onsite and integrated mental health providers, with the Distributed Ambulatory Research and Therapeutics Network (DARTNet), a federated network of primary care practices that have electronic health records. This new entity will conduct comparative effectiveness research examining the effectiveness of mental health, substance abuse, and health behavior interventions delivered by combinations of behavioral/mental health clinicians and primary care clinicians to primary care patients within primary care practices.

CoNNECT recruited CCRN practices with collaborative care delivery models and existing DARTNet practices without collaborative care to examine similarities and differences between practices that have onsite mental health providers compared to primary care practices that use a traditional referral model of offsite mental health providers.

Two main elements tracked in this study:

1. The number of patients identified with a comorbid mental health and physical health diagnosis; and
2. The number of patients who initiate treatment secondary to a mental health diagnosis. CoNNECT will use AcTIONet's relationship with CINA to extract data from electronic health records to generate this data and combine it with other data from participating practices.

For additional information on how CoNNECT and DARTNet will work together, please visit www.dartnet.info/CoNNECT.htm.
 

Posters and Presentations

Miller B. Initial results from CoNNECT. Poster presentation at: the North American Primary Care Research Group Conference; 2012 Dec 1-5; New Orleans, LA.

Miller B. Integrated care: Good data can lead to transforming healthcare. Paper presented at: Leveraging Knowledge and Action to Improve Health Care Quality. 6th Annual Conference of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality; 2012 September 9-12; Bethesda, MD.

Miller B. CoNNECT: Collaborative National Networks Examining Comparative Effectiveness Trials. Poster presented at: Leveraging Knowledge and Action to Improve Health Care Quality. 6th Annual Conference of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality; 2012 September 9-12; Bethesda, MD.

Miller B, McLouth R. Studying the impact of behavioral health and primary care through electronic medical records: The CoNNECT project. Poster presented at: Annual Meeting of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality National Practice Based Research Network; June 21-22; 2012. Bethesda, MD.

Miller B. Collaborative National Network Examining Comparative Effectiveness Trials. 60 Second Presentation at: the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Multiple Chronic Conditions Research Network Meeting; 2012 May 17-18; Rockville, MD.

Miller B and McLouth R. Researching the impact of mental health integration in primary care through electronic medical records. Poster presented at: Society of Teachers of Family Medicine Conference on Practice Improvement; 2011 Dec 1-4; Newport Beach, CA.

Miller B. Leveraging clinical data for behavioral intervention and care coordination. Poster presented at: Corporate Research Group Executive Healthcare Industry Forum on Integrated Behavioral Healthcare Impacting Care Coordination and Chronic Disease Management; 2011 Oct 27; New York, NY.

Kessler R, and Miller B. Data data everywhere but not a drop that is useful. Poster presented at: Integrated Care: The Essential Role of Integrated Care in Healthcare Reform. 7th Annual Two Worlds Unite Symposium; 2011 Mar 19; Chapel Hill, NC.

Miller B. Researching the impact of co-located mental health providers in primary care. Poster presented at: Society of Teachers of Family Medicine Conference on Practice Improvement; 2010 Dec; San Antonio, TX.