Engaging Persons with Severe Persistent Mental Illness into Primary Care

Persons with severe and persistent mental illness (SPMI) consistently experience inadequate primary health care. Very little is known about what promotes primary care (PC) engagement by persons with SPMI. That gap was addressed by a recently published qualitative study that described the social process of engagement in PC from the perspective of those with SPMI. This article describes the clinical implications of the findings from the qualitative study. Categories of engagement are described, and clinical practice implications based on these categories aim to promote engagement in PC with this population.