Behavioral Health

3,000 more New Mexicans to lose behavioral health provider
|
Another Arizona-based behavioral health provider is leaving New Mexico, officials announced Friday. In the latest departure, 3,000 patients currently in substance abuse, mental health and other behavioral health programs—mostly in Northern New Mexico—will have to find a new provider in 90 days, according to a report in today’s Santa Fe New Mexican. The newspaper reported that Agave Health, Inc. is leaving the state, the third of five behavioral health providers from Arizona to leave the state since the shakeup in 2013. “Today, Agave is faced with an insurmountable obstacle, and after many months of undue financial hardship and the foreseen rate reductions in Medicaid rates, the board of directors has regretfully decided to close Agave Health,” Dr. Heath Kilgore, chief executive officer of Agave, and Jeff Jorde, president of the firm, said in a statement. Agave Health is the third of the five Arizona firms to leave New Mexico since the state signed contracts with them for more than $17 million.