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The Use Case by RecruitingDaily
Storytelling About Total Mental Health By TELUS Health With Dr. Matthew Chow
Are you ready to shatter the stigma around mental health? Strap in as we journey into the arena of mental health with our esteemed guest, Matthew Chow, a psychiatrist and the Chief Mental Health Officer at Tellus Health. Our conversation centers around their innovative product, Total Mental Health. It's specially designed to combat the rising tide of mental health challenges in the wake of the pandemic. We delve deep into the disquieting statistics like 22% of US workers harboring a high mental health risk and the persistent, stubborn levels of elevated mental health risks post-pandemic. Listen as we unpack the cascading effects of these challenges on productivity and the unique struggles faced by working parents.
We also examine the critical need to normalize seeking assistance in regards to mental health. In our bid to shed light on employer's role in mental well-being, Matthew shares insights on how organizational support can accelerate the journey back to health for employees. Dive into the intricate discourse on privacy concerns and how Tellus Health ensures a secure environment for individuals to report mental health issues fearlessly. Tune in to understand how Total Mental Health by Tellus Health is bridging the gaping chasm in mental health support and helping individuals reclaim their health.
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This is William Tincap and you are listening to the Use Case Podcast. Today we have Matthew on and he's from Tellus, but we're going to be talking about a product or an offering that they have now called Total Mental Health by Tellus. We'll learn all about that today. Matthew, would you do us a favor and introduce both yourself and Tellus, or what you do at Tellus, and we'll talk a little bit about the Total Mental Health product.
Speaker 2:It's fantastic to be with you today. So my name is Matt, I am a psychiatrist, so a medical specialist in mental health, and I'm the chief mental health officer of Tellus Health. We are one of the largest healthcare companies in the world and, in fact, we're the largest global employee assistance program provider in the world, proudly having a footprint in the US since 1987, covering the lives of some 15 and a half million people and 3,400 clients and counting, and today I'm proud to talk a little bit more about our recent launch of Total Mental Health in the US.
Speaker 1:Tellus. I'm familiar with Tellus' brand because of, I think, insurance that I've had in the past. Had you always in the AP, so I'm familiar with the brand. But I'm sure people it's a brand that sticks with you, so I'm sure most people have interacted with it in some form in their career or in some place. Tell us a little bit about how Total Mental Health kind of came to be, how the product came to be.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we recognized that there were some gaps in the mental health and being and employee assistance program spaces in the US. Certainly, coming out of the pandemic, what we saw is that there has been just an explosion of mental health difficulties that people are experiencing and, in fact, the mental health index that we publish on a regular basis shows that around 22% of workers in the US have a high mental health risk, 42% have a moderate mental health risk, and these are persistently elevated levels that have stubbornly stayed high since the pandemic. And so we recognize that clearly what was out there in the market, clearly the services and supports that people are receiving are not enough and that there was a space to get in there and to help folks out, and that was the genesis of Total Mental Health.
Speaker 1:So the difficulties, let's say post pandemic, as if we're totally out of it. Anyway, outside of the 2000, 2020 and 21 version of COVID, what are the difficulties? That kind of sprung to life or maybe some of the things that pre-pandemic weren't as visible and then after the pandemic, well, that became obviously more visible.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's a couple of areas I can certainly comment with respect to that Mental health negatively impacting people's work productivity. So one in five workers are currently reporting that their mental health personally is negatively impacting their productivity at work, and 48% of workers in the management of companies and enterprises sector just as an example of one specific sector are reporting that mental health is having a negative impact on productivity 29% in the technology sector, 28% in the utilities, construction and administrative support services and these again are all elevated off of their baseline from before the pandemic. And then we're also seeing employees with kids having a lower mental health score compared to employees without children. So we speculate about the impact of the pandemic and the conditions of the pandemic school closures and such on employees with families, and then just other factors in terms of substance use, people relying on maladaptive coping strategies those are all elevated and continue to be elevated since what I could call the crisis phase of the pandemic.
Speaker 1:One of the things I wanted to ask you about is as people become, I guess, a bit more vocal or the mental health that they're doing with it is less taboo, right?
Speaker 1:So, like pre-COVID, way before COVID, I was diagnosed with a form of what we used to call manic depressive, but I guess it's bipolar now, but it's called hypomania. It's like a form of where I'm in mania a whole lot, but when I'm not in mania I'm in really dark depression like suicide or suicidal thoughts, et cetera. And pre-pandemic I probably wouldn't have talked too much about it, I wouldn't have talked on a podcast about it, but during the pandemic and post pandemic it's just been easier to talk with because other people would talk about things, other people would talk about what they're going through. And I wanted to ask you the question about reporting. So the baselines that we have pre-pandemic and in post-pandemic, how do you factor in or, as a professional, as you deal with this, how do you look at, like people's openness and willingness to talk more openly about difficulties that they're having, versus maybe a time where they wouldn't have shared as much?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm so glad you raised this because, as a mental health professional, it is incredibly. It fills me with hope to see so many people actually talking about their mental health and realizing that there is no health without mental health, and it seems like such a like a simple thing to say. But for the longest time, it was actually tremendously difficult as you elaborated on yourself to talk about mental health, to disclose mental health conditions, especially to your employer, even to people's own families, and so there was a tremendous stress and pressure on people to keep a lid on mental health and well-being issues, even though we know now that these have such a tremendous impact on people. Now, certainly, a part of what we're seeing these elevated mental health risks, these elevated patterns of mental health conditions and distress some of that can be attributed to the fact that people are just more willing to talk about it and report it. Absolutely, I think that's a part of that trend, but I think there's also a part of this trend that is due to the pandemic conditions and the response of the pandemic.
Speaker 2:That goes beyond simply increased reporting by people. In other words, it's quote, unquote, it's real and certainly when you look at really hard data on things like substance use, for example. Right, because substance use we can measure that. We can measure how much alcohol people are using, we can measure how much drugs people are using, how much people are buying, how much they're consuming, and all of those show trends that are elevated compared to their pre-pandemic baseline or norms.
Speaker 2:And this is more than just reporting. People are clearly turning to these substances, both legal and illicit, to help cope with the distress they're experiencing. And all of that leads back to tell us health and total mental health. And why we're doing this is that we're clearly seeing something that is impacting the workforce. Clearly there's a gap here and we want to address that gap by offering something novel which is comprehensive mental health support, personalized mental health support, so that people can get back to their best possible selves, and certainly that would. That will impact them at work and improve their productivity, but even more than that, it just it restores them to health and it restores them to their communities and to their families and to their loved ones, which is also tremendously important.
Speaker 1:The self-reporting part of that is probably still a barrier for a lot of folks for some reason, especially with the EAP or health insurance also being managed by HR. It'd be different, I think, if these things weren't managed by the same group of people.
Speaker 2:CB.
Speaker 2:All right, we hear about those concerns, and something that TELUS has done all along Again, we have a pretty long track record, decades of experience in this area is we really think carefully about the privacy of people's information and we treat it with the utmost respect, and that extends to the need for people that are reporting mental health issues to have privacy, so that information is not shared beyond the people that absolutely need to know.
Speaker 2:And those people that need to know would be care providers, care practitioners, healthcare professionals that are working with them, people that might be involved in the immediate management of that care journey. But that's where it stops, and so something that stands out about our program is that we make sure that, for example, when we help out our clients with data around, let's say, the use of mental health resources, with understanding the mental health of their workforce, we're sharing that in aggregate. We're not sharing the personal healthcare and sensitive healthcare information of individual employees. What we're sharing is aggregate data that is actionable by an employer, actionable by a client, but that ultimately protects the privacy of those individuals and that creates the confidence for people to actually report that they're having some difficulty and they need help.
Speaker 1:It's funny because, like my brothers and I were so different and we all have same DNA, but one of my brothers just doesn't believe in therapy, like at all, like conceptually or otherwise, just doesn't believe in it. And I do. I think therapy should be mandatory. So I'm on the other end of the spectrum, if you will. So how does an EAP can only do so much? And I get that being there when someone needs you and being available, being easy to find and obviously I love that you already touched on personalization, because I was going to ask you about that anyhow but what do you do in the instance, especially for the employers that are listening, what do you do where someone just won't they just won't seek help. They won't seek professional help for some reason?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and certainly I want to reinforce that. Having that service available, giving people the confidence that when they reach out for help, that they're going to receive help, that they're going to have somebody that's capable and professional that's going to help them, is such a critical part of it. But what you're alluding to is that you also have to create a culture within the organization that it's okay to reach out, it's okay to talk about mental health, and that's something that needs to happen across the organization and it needs to happen in the leadership as well. I've worked in organizations where that wasn't handled very well and so people clammed up. People didn't want to talk about mental health issues or they would seek help separately.
Speaker 2:And then I've worked at places like at Tellis, where we openly talk about mental health issues. We have leaders that talk about having had therapy themselves, having had treatment themselves, having benefited from help themselves, and when you hear your leaders actually talk so openly, it creates permission for everyone across the organization to get help. So I 'd actually say it's a one-two punch. It's around having the service available and making sure that the company is thoughtful about securing the right kind of help and services for their workforce, and then it's about the culture, making sure the culture is in place so that it's I'll use a buzzword here psychologically safe for people to actually talk about these issues and then to get help.
Speaker 1:It's fascinating to me because once you get over to the first hurdle which I think is easier these days with folks 100%. When I think back to med school.
Speaker 2:It was just even, and I'd like to think I haven't been in practice that long, though it's interesting to see my medical students and trainees now actually entering into leadership roles themselves. But when I was in medicine, mental health was still taboo. Substance use especially like still taboo, like nobody wanted to talk about substance, right, that was the thing that you hit under the table. The families didn't talk about. There's Uncle Bob who has an issue, or Sally left the company suddenly and you don't know why, and there's performance management issues and a lot of times it's actually around substances. Now we actually talk about it more. We still got some learning to do. We still got some cultural issues to overcome as a society and within our companies and workforces, but we're certainly making some progress on that front.
Speaker 1:How do you do you delineate between therapy and things that are more brain chemistry related?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so the beauty of something like total mental health is that we make sure that personalized journey is appropriate to whatever problem people have, and so sometimes, a lot of times, what people need is counseling, what people need is therapy, and so we help connect people to therapy.
Speaker 2:But other times we recognize that people need other types of services. They might need anti-depressant medication, for example, if they have a severe depression. They might need some medication to help them with anxiety, if the anxiety is overwhelming and crippling them both at work and at home, and our navigators and advisors will help connect people to the appropriate services so that, no matter what their mental health and being challenge is, they're going to get the right kind of support. We don't force people to commit to a particular path, regardless of what their problem is. What we do is listen to what people's needs are and then help them get to the right supports and services, and in our case, we're very strong on our network, our global network. We've got one of the largest global networks of health professionals in the world, actually, and we have a particular strength in counseling and therapy support for people.
Speaker 1:Oh that's cool, I can see, especially the first time someone calls or reaches out, whatever, then it becomes a game of finding out. Because you mentioned said what's said, and of course I'm thinking about what's not said it assumes that the person knows what's wrong with them, right, and in my own case I had no idea. It's all brain chemistry. It wasn't therapy related, it was just hostess, undiagnosed for a long time.
Speaker 2:Which is not an unusual story Even in the 21st century. Even as much as science around mental health has advanced, for a lot of people what you're shared about yourself and I really appreciate you actually being open about that is still pretty common these days. It's a journey. It's a journey to figure out what's going on. It's a journey to get help.
Speaker 1:What I found with my situation is my wife had to be the history. She's the one that had to be with me on that not had to, but was on the journey with me. So she actually took notes, especially once we got into medication and I was trying different things, different combinations of things. She's the one that actually had to talk to my doctor because I couldn't remember. So it was for anybody that listening to this, you're going through something like that, obviously seeking professional help, check. But I love the way that you bring people in. It's personalized, listen to them, and then do you have a diagnostic that you take people through, or do you have a rubric that you can kind of wave, find them into the right kind of situation?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so when people journey through total mental health and I like to describe it as a journey they're going to get a dedicated care coordinator, and you could also think of them as an advisor or a navigator or a coach that helps you along that journey.
Speaker 2:They're going to assess the difficulty, they're going to see what services would make the most sense in your situation and then here's the most critical part they're going to be with you as you go along this journey to help make sure that you get to the right place. And that is so important because, especially when we're vulnerable, especially when we are being affected by mental health challenges, it's really hard to keep things straight. It's really hard to remember all these different appointments, it's really hard to remember all the different historical details. Having that dedicated person there to journey alongside you, to keep things on track, to keep taking your feedback, to make sure that you're getting to the right place, that is so important. And we put that there in place because, as an experienced company that provides these services, we've had a wealth of feedback from people, and this is something that is important to folks. It's supported by the science and it's supported by the care journeys of so many millions of people that have been through our services. Q.
Speaker 1:Do you think with folks that haven't taken, they haven't worked with the AP and they haven't worked with TELUS, or they haven't worked with a specific product like Total Mental Health? Do you think there's a stigma that still out there, that therapies it's never ending? The end point is or the journey might not ever be, you might never ever reach the destination.
Speaker 2:So, if that makes sense, yeah, I've certainly heard that concern, and something that's important about this journey someone's personalized mental health and being journeyed through our program is that it has a beginning and it also has, for the most part, a natural end. We don't want people to be in therapy forever, just like we don't want anyone to be suffering from symptoms and concerns forever. And this is not a license to have an open-ended, never-ending journey, because that's not appropriate either. We really are in the business of helping people and supporting people so that they can get back to their best possible lives, so that employers can have a healthy workforce, and that means that these journeys have a natural beginning and end.
Speaker 2:And sometimes and this is not unusual in mental health sometimes people's journeys have multiple steps. People have an issue, they get help, they recover and then maybe a new stressor shows up in their lives, a new situation shows up later on, and then they have either a recurrence of the same problem or a new problem and then they get some help again, and we want to normalize that for people. We want to make sure people understand that's okay and that's common. But, yeah, we're not in the business of having people be in therapy forever, because that's not appropriate and it's not necessary.
Speaker 1:I love that. I love that because I was going to ask you about suffering and silence. We don't want that either, so you don't want one in terms of feeling like you're going to be in therapy forever Okay, check but you also don't want to suffer, especially in silence forever.
Speaker 2:Exactly, yeah, and I find and I'm someone that's actually benefited from therapy myself as well I feel comfortable sharing with you that I've experienced professional burnout and mental health challenges and I've really benefited from therapy, and so that was a journey for me that had a beginning and an end, and my only regret that can express from that journey is not seeking help sooner Feeling ah, is this severe enough? Is it worth the therapist's time? Is it worth the doctor's time? And now I'm kicking myself thinking why did I even think that?
Speaker 1:Of course it's worth their time right?
Speaker 2:If I had a broken leg or diabetes or cancer. I wouldn't question whether it was worth the health professional's time, but I think it's the last frontier. Mental health and substance use there's still sometimes that feeling like, ah, is this severe enough and is it worthwhile to get help? I'm here to say yes, it is. You are worth it Get out there and get that help. And to the employers out there is make sure that help is available to people.
Speaker 1:Yeah, again, getting them back to their best version of themselves. The faster that we can do that, the faster they can get back to productivity and feeling better. This is where interests are aligned. You, as an employer, you want them to be the best version of themselves, because you want to reap the benefits of that productivity, et cetera but you also want them to be living a healthy life and enjoying life 100%. Everybody's interest is aligned. Go ahead.
Speaker 2:It's a true win scenario, right, and it's becoming more of an imperative. Let's go looking beyond the mental health statistics. There's just the fact that right now it's a tight labor market. People have options and these days people are looking beyond monetary compensation and they're also looking at how does my employer align with my values? How does my employer help me when I'm feeling vulnerable? What supports are they bringing to the table? And in a competitive environment for talented people, having the right supports for people highlights that an employer's values and the potential employee's values are in alignment.
Speaker 1:It's interesting because, as you were saying, I was thinking about how recruiters can sell this, how they can basically make sure that candidates know that this is available to them. So, having a better understanding of their EAP, but also having a better understanding of tell us, in particular, in total, mental health, because it's questions that candidates ask before they. It's questions that they hey, how open are you about mental health? Like, that's a question probably six out of 10 recruiters get on a daily basis. So it's didn't be able to point to something specific and say, hey, listen, not only do we have it covered, we've got a great program and this is what it does. This will help you accept 100 percent?
Speaker 2:Huh, because it's a concrete demonstration of those values yeah. Because we talked about culture earlier. Culture is important, of course, but beyond the talk, you also got to walk the walk.
Speaker 1:That's right.
Speaker 2:One point Exactly Right, and having a program in place demonstrates to folks that you're not just talking about mental health and being, you're actually acting on mental health and well-being.
Speaker 1:Love it. Drops mic, walks off stage. Matt, thank you so much for carving out time. I know you're crazy busy. I appreciate you coming in and talking to the audience about TELUS in general, but also specifically the total mental health product that you have. It's been a pleasure Absolutely, and thanks everyone for listening Until next time.
