An audit to assess the impact of an Integrated Psychological Medicine Service (IPMS) on healthcare utilization pre & post intervention. We hypothesized that an IPMS approach would reduce healthcare utilization.

The IPMS focusses on integrating biopsychosocial assessments into physical healthcare pathways. It has developed in stages as opportunities presented in different specialities leading to a heterogeneous non-standardised service. The key aim is involvement of mental health practitioners, psychologists & psychiatrists in complex patients with comorbidity or functional presentations in combination with the specialty MDT. This audit is the first attempt to gather data across all involved specialities and complete a randomised deep dive into cases.

Referrals into IMPS from July 2019 to June 2020 pulled 129 referrals, of which a 10% randomised sample of 13 patients was selected to analyse. 5 patients had one year of data either side of the duration of the IPMS intervention (excluding 8 patients with incomplete data sets).

We analysed; the duration & nature of the IPMS intervention, the number, duration & speciality of inpatient admissions & short stays, outpatient attendances, non-attendances & patient cancellations. Psychosocial information was also gathered. One non-randomised patient was analysed as a comparative case illustration.

Randomised patients; patient 78's utilisation remained static, patient 71 post-referral engaged with health psychology & reduced healthcare utilisation. Patient 7 increased healthcare utilisation post-referral secondary to health complications. Patient 54 did not attend & increased healthcare utilisation post-referral. Patient 106 had increased healthcare utilisation post-referral from a new health condition. The randomised sample identified limitations of using healthcare utilisation as an outcome measure when contrasted to the non-randomised case (which significantly reduced healthcare utilisation post-referral).

Correlation only can be inferred from the data due to sample size, limitations & confounding factors e.g. psycho-social life events, acquired illness. Alternative outcome measurements documented (e.g PHQ9/GAD7) were not reliably recorded across pathways.

The results evidenced that single cases can demonstrate highly desirable effects of a biopsychosocial approach but they can also skew data sets if results are pooled due to the small sample size & heterogeneous interventions. With some patients an increase in healthcare utilisation was appropriate for an improved clinical outcome. This audit identified that utilising healthcare utilisation as an outcome measure is a crude tool with significant limitations & the need to agree tailored outcome measures based on the type of intervention to assess the impact of IPMS.