What You Should Know:
– Behavioral Health Tech Impact (BHT Impact), a new national platform, has officially launched with the mission of accelerating youth behavioral health innovation.
– Funded by Pivotal, a group of organizations founded by Melinda French Gates, BHT Impact aims to support youth and families in becoming designers and builders of future solutions.
Addressing the Urgent Youth Mental Health Crisis
The launch responds to an urgent need for resources in youth mental health:
- Prevalence: More than 5.3 million adolescents ages 12–17 have a current, diagnosed mental health condition.
- Access Gap: Yet, 20% of adolescents in this age group report having unmet mental health care needs.
Innovators seeking to address this gap often struggle to navigate systemic barriers, such as Medicaid reimbursement, or align on measurement tools to communicate their impact. Consequently, effective behavioral tech services often remain out of reach for those who need them most.
Strategy: Co-Design, Medicaid Navigation, and Measurement
BHT Impact will provide free resources and programs designed to help innovators overcome key barriers to scaling youth-focused solutions:
- Medicaid Navigation: The platform will offer support to help solutions successfully navigate the complexities of Medicaid.
- Impact Measurement: Initiatives will be launched to address the system-wide issue of demonstrating which solutions deliver value, impact, and sustainability.
- Co-Design with Youth: Youth and families will remain central to the platform, with their voices amplified across all activities to ensure solutions reflect their needs. Anjlee Joshi, Program Director, emphasized the goal of having young people be co-designers of these solutions, not just patients or users.
“There are so many innovative and courageous leaders focusing on youth behavioral health but time and time again, I hear them discuss how difficult it is to navigate our complex systems,” said Solome Tibebu, Executive Chair, BHT Impact. “BHT Impact will make it easier to bring effective solutions to life so that we can accelerate these incredible innovators and support our future youth leaders.”
Behavioral Health Tech 2025 Conference
The platform’s first in-person programming will debut in partnership with the Behavioral Health Tech 2025 Conference in San Diego in November. At the conference, BHT Impact will host interactive Q&A sessions with Medicaid experts, offer dedicated mentorship and scholarship programs, and foster networking opportunities.
