UNM behavioral clinic adds providers, services

Director cites increasing demand due to the pandemic

RIO RANCHO — The services at the UNM Behavioral Health Clinic in Rio Rancho are expanding, even amid the pandemic.

The clinic, at the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center campus in City Center, is serving about 200 patients and has openings for more, said clinical director and psychologist Christopher Morris. The staff is growing as well.

“We’ve been able to add our prescribing providers,” Morris said, explaining that the clinic can now offer psychiatric medication management.

The three providers who can write prescriptions are each available one day a week.

“They all have different backgrounds, different specialties, which is good,” he said.

Morris plans to recruit more providers, including prescribers, to the clinic, but said it’s difficult due to the shortage of behavioral health care workers in New Mexico.

Now, the clinic has two psychologists, a full-time therapist, three prescribing providers, two wraparound care specialists and one certified family peer support worker.

The wraparound care specialists and family peer support worker are part of the New Mexico Systems of Care program, a partnership with the state Children, Youth and Families Department. The program supports youth with the most complex behavioral health needs and their families.

Those youth have been involved with multiple systems, such as child protective services, juvenile justice and special education.

“It can be challenging when a family has to deal with all those systems,” he said.

Morris said the program’s goal is to help the youth and their families identify and move toward goals, with support that includes friends and extended family.

He’s looking for a wraparound-care team leader. People with a behavioralhealth or social-work background can apply at unmjobs.unm.edu.

The aim of the whole clinic is to grow to meet the needs in Sandoval County, he continued.

“We have seen increasing demand in the current pandemic,” Morris said.

Mental-health providers commonly see patients fail to keep appointments 20% to 25% of the time, he said.

“And that no-show rate has dropped to near zero in COVID-19, which is significant,” he continued. “People are anxious and stressed.”