Loren Data's SAM Daily™

FBO DAILY - FEDBIZOPPS ISSUE OF MARCH 31, 2016 FBO #5242
DOCUMENT

R -- Vets Prevail Online Reintegration Support and Mental Health Early Interve - Attachment

Notice Date

3/29/2016
 

Notice Type

Attachment
 

NAICS

624190 — Other Individual and Family Services
 

Contracting Office

Department of Veterans Affairs;Health Administration Center;3773 Cherry Creek Drive North, Suite 450;Denver CO 80209
 

ZIP Code

80209
 

Archive Date

4/28/2016
 

Point of Contact

Maurice Walker
 

Small Business Set-Aside

N/A
 

Award Number

VA741-16-C-0006
 

Award Date

3/29/2016
 

Description

Performance Work Statement (PWS) Vets Prevail 1.Background One of VHA's primary missions is to ensure that our Veterans receive the best evidence-based health care available. In order to provide such care we must first engage Veterans in our system and then match the care VA provides to Veterans' needs as that changes over time. Of the 1,557,026 separated OEF/OIF/OND Veterans, 56% have obtained VA health care since FY 2002 and of those about 62% used VA health care in FY2012. This means that 44% of these Veterans have not engaged in VA health care and only 33% of them received any VA health care in FY 2012. Of the OEF/OIF/OND Veterans who obtained VA health care, about 54% of them had one or more mental health (MH) diagnoses. One can surmise that those who have not engaged in VA care have a similar prevalence of MH diagnoses. Veterans who have returned from multiple deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan are at high risk for developing PTSD, Depression, and Substance Use Disorders (SUDs) (VHA Office of Public Health and Environmental Hazards, 2008). Rates of alcohol misuse, prescription drug abuse, and suicide among this cohort of military Veterans are reaching epidemic proportions (Institute of Medicine, 2012). Despite the significant investments that have been made to improve mental health and substance abuse treatment services through VA hospitals and clinics (VHA, 2008) and the Readjustment Counseling Service or Vet Centers (VHA, 2010), much more needs to be done to ensure that OIF/OEF Veterans receive the mental health services they need (U.S. Executive Order, 2012). Decisions not to engage with traditional treatment services may involve negative attitudes about mental health (Dickstein et al., 2010), concern about being stigmatized, and expectations of negative career impact. Because military culture heavily values self-reliance, many individuals equate asking for help as a sign of weakness and fear that seeking help would lead coworkers to lose confidence in them (Tanlielian & Jaycox, 2008). Veterans living in rural areas have additional logistical and practical barriers to accessing mental health care. Thus, online self-help programs may play a key role in providing evidence-based care for Veterans experiencing symptoms of SUDs and related mental health comorbidities. Online self-help programs can overcome many barriers to mental health services. OIF/OEF Veterans are "digital natives" - they come from a generation that has grown up online and relies on internet and mobile technologies in virtually every aspect of their lives. While on Active Duty, Service Members across all five branches of the U.S. Military regularly access self-paced online courses to address their mandatory training requirements and to support operational readiness (Willmann, 2013). The military relies on online learning because it can reliably deliver high quality training to a geographically dispersed audience 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Online programs designed to improve psychological health and resiliency (e.g. www.vetsprevail.org; www.afterdeployment.org) have the same advantages - they can reach individuals in rural areas and can be accessed at any time of the day or night. Such online programs have the further advantage of overcoming the stigma that prevents many Service Members and Veterans from seeking help for a mental health (MH) disorders. An individual who may not otherwise seek help may feel more comfortable addressing these issues on his/her own, or asking for the confidential assistance of an online counselor or peer. Online self-help programs may provide a feasible, evidence-based treatment alternative for those who do not access traditional services due to the stigma of an MH diagnosis. Our nation's newest Veterans are the most technologically-savvy group of Veterans that have sought care in VA's history. These Veterans want VA to provide them with the ability to contact their providers via email and text, schedule online appointments and track their health through the web-based MyHealthEVet. VA cannot afford to wait for Veterans to come to our bricks and mortar establishments. We must meet Veterans where they are - online. In addition, the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee has suggested to VA that we work to build ties to the behavioral health community outside of VA and to encourage the development of peer coalitions where Veterans can help other Veterans during the post-deployment reintegration process. As can been seen from the statistics above, these Veterans are often struggling with behavioral health issues and we know from the treatment literature that early intervention is less costly and more effective than treating Veterans many years after their homecoming. Use of Vets Prevail will allow VHA to capitalize on current legislative trends to leverage highly ranked community efforts to address specific Veteran needs. More specifically, from the Executive Order issued near the end of 2012, the President appeals for contracts with "community partners in helping to meet the mental health needs of veterans in a timely way" and allow for more "peer to peer counselors to empower veterans to support other veterans and help meet mental health care needs". The Vets Prevail program is a systematic online behavioral health intervention rooted in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy ("CBT") and peer support. The model was developed under a series of NSF grants, in collaboration with researchers and clinicians at the University of Chicago, Northwestern University, Rush university Medical Center and the Beck Academy of Cognitive Therapy. It is an evidence-based online program with demonstrated efficacy. At the highest level, Vets Prevail program is about user acquisition, engagement and routing: how to find Veterans who are reluctant care-seekers, engage them in an evidence-based program and then route those who need immediate help to VA resources. Prevail (the company that created Vets Prevail) is a Service Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business ("SDVOSB") that is comprised mainly of Veterans who have been working on the technology behind the Vets Prevail program since early 2008 with the backing of the National Science Foundation ("NSF") and the collaboration of mental health researchers and clinicians at the University of Chicago, Northwestern, and Rush University Medical Center ("Rush"). 2.Scope of Work The purpose of this solicitation is to award delivery orders to a qualified contractor to provide an online-self-help and peer support program to Veterans for 6 months. 3.Description of Work Prevails agrees to do the following for this contract: EXECUTION Prevail will deliver on three main program elements and services throughout the remainder of the contract term: 1.Maintaining VHA specific program marketing efforts. a.Prevail will deliver a marketing campaign, involving both digital and traditional strategies, which will drive awareness and use of the Vets Prevail program and detail the benefits of the VHA collaboration. Prevail will work with VHA representatives to leverage and integrate with appropriate VHA social media and other marketing outreach efforts where appropriate. 2.Providing ongoing 24/7 access to the VHA sponsored program. a.Prevail will provide access to the program through a VHA-branded landing page which will allow any individual self-certifying as a US Veteran to register for an account and enroll in the full Vets Prevail program offering. The program experience will begin from this customized landing page, which will serve as the main entry point for Vets Prevail participants moving forward, with Prevails digital marketing efforts driving potential participants to this landing page. From the landing page, the program will guide the user through a customized enrollment path during which all Veterans will receive an initial mental health screening. b.Prevail will provide access to the program through a VHA-branded landing page which will allow any individual self-certifying as a US Veteran to register for an account and enroll in the full Vets Prevail program offering. The program experience will begin from this customized landing page, which will serve as the main entry point for Vets Prevail participants moving forward, with Prevails digital marketing efforts driving potential participants to this landing page. From the landing page, the program will guide the user through a customized enrollment path during which all Veterans will receive an initial mental health screening. c.Prevail will use their screening model to design customized programs for each Veteran served. They will socialize new registrants to the screening process by informing them that assessments are "needed to help customize their personal program before they begin". d.Prevail will employ standardized measures for depression, anxiety, and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder ("PTSD"). Vets Prevail may also use other validated instruments to tease out indications of additional comorbid mental health conditions. Prevail would design a specific assessment logic for the VHA using the Prevail smart-assessment branching capability to create a concise screening experience to identify indicated conditions while limiting the overall number of questions. e.Prevail will provide ongoing program assessments will screen for and track longitudinal changes in depression, anxiety, and attitudes towards care. After Veterans complete the screening tools, their assessment responses will be processed by Vets Prevail to generate a unique profile including symptomology, demographic information, and referral "flags" that signal the system to later intelligently connect them to a network of VHA-identified resources. These "other" conditions have been established in past programs, and new ones could be agreed upon during the program set-up period. Those identified in this phase as needing support for a clinical disorder (outside the scope of the online program) will be referred by automated email to the most-appropriate local clinical resource and connected with a provider. f.After the initial assessment and "triage," the Vets Prevail program will lay out a series of tasks tailored for relevancy to systematically address each participant's risk factors and demographics. These tasks will focus on improving self-management skills, building mental resilience and functional status, and mitigating the behavioral health conditions that are often co-morbid with other medical conditions and prevent care-seeking or undermine adherence. g.The Vets Prevail program will provide Veterans with its Assessment Results Interactive Conversation that will explain the results of an assessment survey to the user providing additional meaning through a virtual chat with an online virtual assistant. h.Veteran users will be directed to a series of evidence-based CBT interactive multimedia lessons. i.Veteran users will also have on-demand access to the CBT program tools which provide additional support and offer the opportunity to practice the methods and processes established by the lesson content. j.Veteran users will be directed to "Instant Message" (IM) chats with Veteran Peers ("Peers"). These IM chats will be conducted by Veterans employed by Prevail that work out of Prevail's offices. The Peers will operate in a call center model, with a workflow engine that matches available Peers with chat requests as they come in. k.All Peers will have completed a peer support training program run by the Depression and Bi-Polar Support Alliance that meets national competency standards set by the Department of Veterans Affairs Office of Mental Health Services for peer support employees before providing services to Veterans through this contract. l.The Peers will conduct the Vets Prevail chats through a web-based dashboard. The dashboard will help the Peer guide the conversation based on the stage of the user in the program and elements of his or her profile. m.Prevail will provide program-related chats including (but not limited to): i.Program milestones (e.g., after users interact with one of the CBT tools for the first time, they are given a chat that debriefs them on the use of the tool and helps them understand its value). ii.Potential issues (e.g., when responses to one of the program surveys indicate certain users may be having financial difficulties, these users would get chats where the Peers would try to understand their problems and get them connected with the appropriate resources). iii."On demand" chats initiated by users with the Peer Counselors. n.Prevail will provides crisis management for any Veteran experiencing distress including a warm hand-off with the National Suicide Prevention chat line. Peers will use an approved suicide risk identification protocol, complete with a warm hand off to the National Suicide Hotline online chat for users that express intent to harm other or self. o.VetsPrevail will offer a dedicated online Veterans Community to that provides timely and relevant answers to both program and non-program Veterans' questions, within 24 hours. p.Vets Prevail program will provide access to their integrated Community question and answer tool, in order to provide a safe anonymous platform where Veterans can support each other in an anonymous and structured direct question and answer exchanges. 3.Reporting on appropriate VHA program metrics at agreed upon intervals. a.Prevail will adhere to a strict monitoring and evaluation plan. During the program period, Prevail will provide monthly reports that will ensure appropriate VHA representatives will have easy-to-consume snapshots of all key program metrics, including, number of Veterans enrolled, program use (including user minutes, chat minutes, average response time to program users questions in the community forum, percentage of users who complete each lesson), referral volume, complaint volume, participant satisfaction, referral volume to the National Suicide Prevention chat line, and de-identified information about the mental and behavioral health of the program participants as well as attitudes toward mental health care. 4.Deliverables ReferenceDeliverableDue Date 4.1.1Maintaining VHA specific program marketing efforts as measured by monthly reports on number of Veterans enrolled, program use & referral volume.Continues through contract end. 4.1.2Providing ongoing 24/7 access to the VHA sponsored program as measured by monthly reports on program use, referral volume to the National Suicide Prevention chat line, and de-identified information about the mental and behavioral health of the program participants. To begin when the planning stage is completed and continues through contract end. 4.1.3Reporting on appropriate VHA program metrics at monthly intervals. To begin when the planning stage is completed and continues through contract end. 4.1.4Will provide VHA with a summary report of all the mentioned metrics.1 month post contract end 5.Period of Performance The period of performance is date of award and will continue on a rolling basis until the budgeted enrollment limit of 2,215 Veterans is reached. As herein described, Prevail will provide VHA with monthly reports of number of Veterans enrolled as well as other information described above. 6.Performance Measures The contractor's performance under this contract must be based on the following measures: Performance MeasuresQuality Expectations a.CompletenessDeliverables must be 100% complete. b.AccuracyDeliverables must be 100% accurate. c.TimelinessAll deliverables must be on time and within schedule. d.CommunicationCommunication with VA is professional and timely - Generally timely is no longer than five (5) business days. Communication with Veteran customers will e.Customer ServiceCollect Veteran satisfaction measures and reports of any complaints. 75% of Veterans will rate the program as at least somewhat helpful. Answers to 75% of program users' questions in the community forum will be posted within 24 hours.
 

Web Link

FBO.gov Permalink
(https://www.fbo.gov/notices/c668902f40ee28754901b22742510155)
 

Document(s)

Attachment
 

File Name: VA741-16-C-0006 VA741-16-C-0006.docx (https://www.vendorportal.ecms.va.gov/FBODocumentServer/DocumentServer.aspx?DocumentId=2641897&FileName=VA741-16-C-0006-000.docx)

Link: https://www.vendorportal.ecms.va.gov/FBODocumentServer/DocumentServer.aspx?DocumentId=2641897&FileName=VA741-16-C-0006-000.docx

 

Note: If links are broken, refer to Point of Contact above or contact the FBO Help Desk at 877-472-3779.
 

Record

SN04065820-W 20160331/160329234618-c668902f40ee28754901b22742510155 (fbodaily.com)
 

Source

FedBizOpps Link to This Notice
(may not be valid after Archive Date)

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