Access to Tailored Autism Integrated Care through Family *Navigation (ATTAIN NAV)***

Summary

ATTAIN NAV was co-designed with caregiver and healthcare partners and delivered by lay navigators to facilitate access to mental health and family support services for school-age children with autism (NIMH R34MH120190).

The Challenge

Autistic children have high rates of co-occurring mental health needs, yet they face multi-level barriers to accessing and engaging with needed care.
Primary care is an optimal place for early mental health needs identification and referral to mental health care.
The Access to Tailored Autism Integrated Care (ATTAIN) study co-created an integrated mental health care model for autistic children in primary care.
Pilot outcomes indicated high feasibility, acceptability, and utility but more specific and tailored implementation support was needed to expedite and secure engagement with mental health services.

The Approach

To address the noted challenges, the ATTAIN NAV study adapted a family navigation intervention for school-age autistic children with co-occurring mental health needs.
ATTAIN NAV was delivered in weekly sessions over 4 months by trained, lay health navigators, focused on collaborative goal development, motivational interviewing, and problem-solving strategies to promote engagement with health and community services.
The impact of ATTAIN NAV was tested in a stepped-wedge, hybrid implementation-effectiveness study.

The Impact

A total of 21 primary care providers enrolled; 157
families were referred via provider or self-referral.

A total of 65 families enrolled and 56 families completed
ATTAIN NAV.

Most families were connected to needed or requested
services and caregivers reported high levels of
satisfaction and benefit from ATTAIN NAV.

Key Benefits

		Theraputic Procedures - Demonstrated Provided an efficient and effective intervention to secure engagement with needed health and community services for autistic children.
		Health Education Resources - Demonstrated Strengthened caregiver advocacy skills and service navigation knowledge.
		Healthcare Accessibility - Demonstrated Family navigation showed potential to help address disparities in access to mental health and community-based care.
		Policies - Potential Findings can be used as a blueprint for healthcare policies considering non-traditional mental health providers as essential members of the care teams.