Profile: Bradford Felker, MD

Bradford Felker, MD completed a combined Psychiatry-Internal Medicine residency at the University of Virginia leading to board certification in both fields. He joined the faculty at the University of Virginia Department of Psychiatry and began his career at the VA, where he developed one of the first programs to integrate primary care services for patients with mental disorders within a specialty mental health clinic. Based on this work, he was recruited to join the faculty at the UW Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences. He continued his work with the VA in Seattle. He then implemented one of the first integrated care services within the VA. This Primary Care Mental Health Integration Service grew to include the two medical centers and seven community-based outpatient clinics at VA Puget Sound. This program was recognized as one of the top ten programs in the VA. His research has been in the area of developing models of care management, implementation of integrated care programs, and the assessment and treatment of PTSD in primary care. His recent research is focused on studying the implementation of tele-mental health services within primary care. Based on this work, he was asked by the Office of Academic Affiliations within the VA to develop next-generation integrated care curriculum at the seven Center of Excellence for Primary Care Education sites in the VA. As a result of his work with integrated care in rural areas, he developed an interest in tele-mental health. He has implemented an innovative network of tele-mental health services that now link all sites within VA Puget Sound as well as many other sites across the Northwest Region. Dr. Felker believes his most important work is developing care management models in the VA as well as looking at ways to integrate all the emerging tele-technologies (Clinical Video Teleconference [CVT], web-based, apps, etc.) into routine mental health care that is delivered within primary care. Dr. Felker believes that in five years tele-health teams as we currently know them will no longer exist. Mental health providers will routinely use a broad range of these emerging technologies to extend the reach, access, and the types of mental health care delivered in all kinds of new settings.