WACO, TX — The Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute was awarded a $10 million Lone Star Prize today; funding that will allow the institute to establish the Lone Star Depression Challenge - a campaign that is aimed to helped Texans receive recovery care and improve overall mental heath care in Texas communities.
Treatments and recovery are not currently readily accessible to Texans until after an average of eight to ten years of symptoms, as a result only 1 in 15 of 1.5 million Texans that suffer from mental health and depression receive the care they need, according to Meadow's Institute.
The Lone Star Depression Challenge hopes to tackle this issue through implementing itself in fully-scaled clinical solutions for the detection and treatment of depression, engagement of marginalized communities, and purchaser-driven market forces to improve overall access.
Meadow's Institute will administer three programs under the challenge - The Cloudbreak Initiative, EMPOWER, and The Path Forward.
The Cloudbreak Initiative will embed early detection and effective treatment in the primary care setting, EMPOWER will reach out using the digital world to effectively build a community-based mental health workforce, and The Path Forward will engage businesses, government, and other market forces to improve overall access to mental healthcare and treatment.
Meadows Institute collaborated with the Center for Depression Research and Clinical Care at UT Southwestern, Harvard Medical School’s Department of Global Health and Social Medicine, and The Path Forward for Mental Health and Substance Use (The Path Forward) to produce The Lone Star Depression Challenge.
“The Lone Star Prize will make possible the first-of-its kind, wide-scale expansion of three proven initiatives to improve the lives of Texans living with depression,” said Andy Keller, President and CEO of Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute. “Our partnership with the Center for Depression Research and Clinical Care at UT Southwestern will catalyze an unprecedented statewide and national effort to put depression care in Texas on par with care for heart disease and cancer, freeing millions more Texans from the cloud of depression and saving hundreds of lives over the next five years. On behalf of the Meadows Institute and our partners in this project, we are immensely grateful to Lyda Hill, Lyda Hill Philanthropies, and Lever for Change for the opportunity and encouragement to dream big and share these bold solutions across our great state.”
