Unlike oncology, cardiology, and orthopedics — specialties that have relied on clinical pathways for decades — behavioral health remains fragmented. Two patients with the same diagnosis can receive entirely different treatment depending on geography, provider training, or reimbursement. That variability drives uneven outcomes, persistent disparities, and limited accountability.
Clinical Care Pathways
A shared national standard for behavioral health care.
Psych Hub is building Clinical Care Pathways (CCPs) — the evidence-based standards, training, and tools that will define quality care for behavioral health. It's a cross-industry effort, and we're convening payers, provider organizations, and professional associations to build it together.
A shared standard of care, built for behavioral health.
Clinical Care Pathways are structured, evidence-based protocols that translate clinical guidelines into consistent, measurable processes of care — defining decision points at each stage of treatment, specifying which outcomes to measure, and creating the shared accountability framework payers and providers need for value-based models. All while preserving the clinical judgment essential to individualized care.
CCPs give the field the operational standard it has lacked: one evidence-based path through each priority condition, with the measurement and accountability payers, providers, and patients can all build on. Developed through a multi-stakeholder process — not handed down — so the standard is one the field will actually adopt.
Behavioral health needs quality infrastructure.
The field lacks the foundational quality infrastructure other medical specialties have relied on for decades. The cost of that gap shows up in dollars, in access, and in outcomes.
$317.6B
annual U.S. cost of untreated mental illness
60M
U.S. adults experience a mental illness yearly
137M
Americans live in a mental health shortage area
<18%
of clinicians use standardized measurement
Co-developed with the field.
The standard is being built openly with the people responsible for using it — led with Healthsperien and the American Psychological Association, with 6+ major national payers and 40+ stakeholder organizations at the table across payers, providers, professional associations, and government.
Health plans contribute expertise on reimbursement, utilization, and data infrastructure — so pathways are measurable and aligned with value-based payment models that reward quality outcomes.
Clinicians and provider organizations contribute frontline expertise on treatment realities, workforce constraints, and the evidence base — so pathways are clinically sound and implementable across settings.
The APA, Shatterproof, ABHW, IRETA, and others anchor pathways in rigorous science and drive broad adoption across disciplines and practice settings.
Federal health agencies bring policy alignment, quality measurement frameworks, and national reach — grounding pathways in public-sector standards and value-based goals.
Priority conditions.
Prioritized by prevalence, service utilization, variation in treatment, and total cost — the conditions where a shared standard moves the field most.
Depression & Mood Disorders
Anxiety Disorders & OCD
Trauma-Related Disorders
Bipolar & Related Disorders
Autism Spectrum Disorders
Psychotic Disorders
Substance Use & Addiction Disorders
Eating Disorders
Attention Disorders
Built with the field.
More than 40 organizations are engaged across the priority conditions — leading payers, provider groups, and professional associations shaping the standard alongside us.
Initiative leads
Major national payers engaged
Provider & network partners
Professional associations & organizations
Become a partner.
Payers, provider groups, and professional associations join the initiative as members. The first step is intentionally simple — a short declaration, not a contract negotiation.
- Attend at least one convening per cycle.
- Acknowledge and promote the CCP initiative with your staff and leadership.
- Permit Psych Hub to list your organization as a member.
- Logo placement on the CCP partner page, alongside leading health plans and associations.
- Recognition as a CCP partner in payer-facing communications.
- Regular updates on CCP development, clinical content, and milestones.
- One free CCP certification per provider in your network (when CCPs launch).
- Expert network access through convenings.
Apply to be a subject-matter expert.
CCPs are built by the field. Clinicians help review the evidence, shape pathway content, and pressure-test what works in real practice. If that's you, we want you in the pool.
Review clinical evidence and existing guidelines, join working-group convenings, and give written and verbal input on CCP content for a priority condition.
Licensed master's- and doctoral-level behavioral health clinicians (PhD, PsyD, LCSW, LPC, LMFT, LMHC) with condition-specific expertise.
An advisory, time-boxed engagement. We follow up with the scope and a participation agreement before you start — no obligation to apply.
The time to act is now.
The organizations that engage now help shape the standards, measurement frameworks, and certification models that define quality care for decades. Become a partner, or apply to help build the pathways.