Dr. Arthur C. Evans steps down Friday after 12 years as commissioner of the city’s Department of Behavioral Health and Intellectual disAbility Services – the name is one of myriad changes, large and small, that came under his watch. Evans brought tremendous vision and led a system-wide transformation effort focused on recovery, resilience, and self-determination. He embraced everything from prevention, early detection and intervention, to a variety of treatment types for the most serious mental illnesses while infusing the use of evidence-based practices throughout the agency’s work.
Philadelphia will need to work hard to maintain and build upon his accomplishments. Much is at stake. The city’s rate of drug overdose fatalities, driven by the opioid epidemic, is the highest in the state and increasing. External threats to the city’s budget are rising as well. It is critically important to protect the current $1.12 billion annual budget for the Department of Behavioral Health and Intellectual disAbility Services (DBHIDS). This budget produces a total economic impact of nearly $4 billion in the city, and supports 25,400 jobs.
Evans brought a public health approach to behavioral health and worked to expand DBHIDS’ focus beyond the safety net – its main responsibility is for the poor – to try to improve the behavioral health and well being of all Philadelphians. To do this, he helped build collaborations with a broad array of partners and community leaders to address social determinants of health such as food, housing, and safety, while also focusing on stigma and raising awareness of the importance of overall health and wellness. Yet Evans would agree there is still much work to be done.
To continue reading this article by Joe Pyle, president of the Thomas Scattergood Behavioral Health Foundation, go to: http://www.philly.com/philly/b...in-Philadelphia.html
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