State Mental Health Policy: Scaling Up Evidence-Based Behavioral Health Care Practices in New York State

This column describes the Center for Practice Innovations (CPI), which was created in 2007 by the New York State Office of Mental Health and the Department of Psychiatry at Columbia University. CPI uses innovative approaches to build stakeholder collaborations, develop and maintain practitioners’ expertise, and build agency infrastructures that support implementing and sustaining evidence-based practices. CPI’s five core initiatives provide training in co-occurring mental and substance use disorders, assertive community treatment, supported employment and education, wellness self-management, and treatment of first-episode psychosis. Central to CPI’s activities are award-winning training modules, statewide learning collaboratives, and use of a learning management system.