Donnelly's Servicemember Mental Health "Care Package" Passes Armed Services Committee

Last updated on Friday, May 15, 2015

(WASHINGTON D.C.) - The Senate Armed Services Committee approved military mental health provisions from U.S. Senator Joe Donnelly’s “Servicemember and Veteran Mental Health Care Package “(“Care Package”) in this year’s national defense bill.

The Fiscal Year 2016 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) received bipartisan support in the Senate Armed Services Committee and will move on to consideration by the full Senate.

The annual bill has been signed into law for 53 consecutive years. As a member of the committee that oversees Department of Defense programs and spending, Donnelly has made military mental health his top priority and generated bipartisan support for a renewed push on suicide prevention since 2013. The "Care Package" would also improve access to quality mental health care for veterans, and Donnelly will be working with the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee in the coming weeks to approve the veterans-related provisions of his legislation.

Donnelly said, "I am pleased the 'Care Package' is in the defense bill. This legislation will improve mental health care for servicemembers in Indiana and across the country. The 'Care Package' would not only strengthen DoD mental health services with a focus on evidence-based best practices, but also enhance the ability of our servicemembers and their families to receive quality mental health care from local providers in our communities. Access to community-based care is particularly important for members of the National Guard. With the fourth-largest National Guard in the country, and organizations like Purdue's Military Family Research Institute here in Indiana, Hoosiers are leading the way in recognizing and serving the unique needs of our Guard and Reserve servicemembers. Building on the success of the Jacob Sexton Act last year, this is another critical step forward to combat the plague of military suicide, and I will continue to work in the weeks ahead to ensure we are improving access to quality mental health care not only for servicemembers, but also for our veterans."

Donnelly succeeded in getting central elements from all three bipartisan "Care Package" bills in the Armed Services Committee-passed defense bill.

By including the Community Provider Readiness Recognition Act, (co-sponsored by Senator Joni Ernst, R-IA), the FY 2016 NDAA would:

Strengthen the quality of care for servicemembers by incentivizing training for community providers on the unique needs of servicemembers and their families;
Create a special military-friendly designation for private providers that meet eligibility criteria relating to knowledge and understanding of military culture and evidence-based mental health treatments; and
Establish a regularly-updated online registry so servicemembers can search for these specially-designated community providers.

This bill is inspired in part by the Star Behavioral Health Provider Network, a program that Purdue University's Military Family Research Institute created in Indiana to train providers to better understand military culture and medical treatments. By designating a provider as part of the Star Behavioral Health Network, it helps servicemembers and their families make informed choices about which private health care providers are well-suited to treat them. By including provisions from the Military and Veterans Mental Health Provider Assessment Act, (co-sponsored by Senator Roger Wicker, R-MS), the FY 16 NDAA would:

Require that all DoD primary care and mental health providers have received evidence-based training on suicide risk recognition and management and that their training be updated to keep pace with changes in mental health care best practices;
Require a report to Congress assessing DoD's mental health workforce and the long-term mental health needs of servicemembers and their families to better inform mental health workforce development, planning and budgeting in the future; and
Require DoD to develop a plan to compile and assess data on mental health outcomes, variations in outcomes across different DoD health care facilities, and barriers to DoD mental health providers implementing clinical practice guidelines and other evidence-based treatments.

In addition, by including elements from the Frontline Mental Health Provider Training Act (cosponsored by Senator John Boozman, R-AR), the Senate legislation calls on DoD to train physician assistants to specialize in psychiatric care in order to help meet increasing demand for mental health services among servicemembers and their families. Organizations supporting the "Care Package" include: The National Guard Association of the United States; the Military Officers Association; Reserve Officers Association; National Military Family Association; and American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. Donnelly met earlier this month with these organizations to discuss the importance of improving mental health outcomes for servicemembers and veterans and how to ensure key provisions of the "Care Package" become law by year's end. The "Care Package" would build on the progress made by Donnelly's Jacob Sexton Military Suicide Prevention Act, which was signed into law late last year and requires an annual mental health assessment for all servicemembers--Active, Guard, and Reserve.

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