In January 2014, jointly funded by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA-HRSA) and the Health Resources and Services Administration and run by the National Council for Behavioral Health and lead and managed by the Annapolis Coalition, nine core competency categories were published for use by multidisciplinary staff in integrated behavior health and primary care educational and workforce sectors.

The core competencies are useful to members of the health care team delivering integrated behavioral health and primary care in a number of ways: education and training, recruitment of employees, job descriptions, enhancing role clarity, preparing and using orientation processes, assessing performance, and benchmarking current and future competency sets. These core competencies have global application. They are: interpersonal communication, collaboration and teamwork, screening and assessment, care planning and care coordination, intervention, cultural competence and adaptation, systems oriented practice, practice-based learning and quality improvement and informatics.

This presentation will highlight each of the 9 competency categories and describe how they reinforce and enhance the competencies of individuals working in the prevention, intervention and recovery of clients/patients /consumers with mental health and substance abuse conditions. These competencies are observable skills that can be measured using a variety of evidence-based evaluation tools. Selected examples of the behavioral objectives within each of the competency categories will be reviewed.