For Dialysis Facilities & Organizations
One partnership. One clear behavioral health pathway.
Novascend helps your team move from screening to referral, psychiatric care, and documented follow-up—without asking facility staff to build a separate behavioral health program from scratch.
The Partnership
A focused program your team can understand and use.
The partnership combines three connected services under one practical workflow.
Screening & Referral Workflow
Establish a clear process for screening, documenting concerns, obtaining consent, and making a warm referral.
- PHQ-9 and GAD-7 workflow guidance
- Referral criteria and staff education
- Documentation and handoff process
Psychiatric Care for Referred Patients
Eligible patients may receive psychiatric evaluation, treatment planning, and follow-up through scheduled telehealth or on-site access, within a monthly referral capacity reserved for the partnership.
- Comprehensive psychiatric evaluation
- Medication management when appropriate
- Kidney-aware treatment considerations
Monthly Program Summary
Give leadership a concise view of referrals, completed appointments, engagement, and follow-up activity.
- Referrals received
- Appointments completed
- Follow-up and engagement activity
Eligible patient-facing services may be billed through patient insurance. Coverage, authorization, and reimbursement requirements apply. Any facility fees—for implementation, reserved capacity, reporting, or administrative support—are set at fair market value, fixed in advance, and are not based on the volume or value of patient referrals.
The Clinical Pathway
From a positive screen to a closed-loop psychiatric record.
Every step below maps directly to the documentation CMS requires for the Clinical Depression Screening and Follow-Up measure—so the clinical work and the quality-measure work happen in the same motion.
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1
Routine Screening
PHQ-9 is administered per the facility’s care-plan schedule and documented in the patient’s record, including item 9 (passive or active thoughts of self-harm).
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2
Positive Screen Identified
A score above the facility’s threshold—or any positive item 9 response—triggers an internal alert, and a referral is sent through the agreed secure channel the same day.
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Urgent Safety Branch
Any active suicidal ideation, intent, or plan is handled entirely through the facility’s existing emergency protocol—911, on-site charge nurse, and nephrology team notification—independent of this partnership. Novascend is notified for situational awareness and, once the patient is medically stable, prioritizes the next available follow-up appointment ahead of routine referrals. Novascend does not provide emergency, crisis, or after-hours clinical response.
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3
Triage, Eligibility & Consent
Novascend reviews the referral, confirms insurance eligibility, and coordinates with facility staff to obtain consent and schedule the first evaluation. Referrals received once the month’s reserved capacity is reached are scheduled into the next available cycle, with the facility notified in advance.
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4
Comprehensive Psychiatric Evaluation
A kidney-aware evaluation distinguishes depressive illness from uremia-related fatigue, anemia, or sleep disruption, and includes medication reconciliation against renal clearance, dialyzability, and interactions with phosphate binders, EPO, and other ESRD therapies.
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5
Documented Follow-Up Plan
Every encounter closes with one of the follow-up pathways CMS recognizes for this measure: active referral and treatment with Novascend, an alternative documented plan, or a clearly documented clinical reason no further follow-up is indicated.
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Ongoing Management
Follow-up visits are scheduled around the patient’s dialysis calendar, with medication titration and monitoring appropriate to renal function throughout treatment.
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7
Care Coordination Loop-Back
The interdisciplinary team receives updates for the care plan, missed-appointment alerts for outreach, and the data behind the monthly program summary.
Workflow steps and timeframes describe Novascend’s standard operating targets within a defined monthly capacity and do not guarantee a specific response time, clinical outcome, or measure score. Novascend does not provide emergency, crisis, or after-hours clinical coverage; medical and psychiatric emergencies are managed at all times through the facility’s existing emergency protocol. Final workflow, consent process, secure-channel selection, and monthly referral capacity are confirmed during partnership design.
What Your Facility Gains
A stronger next step after a positive screen.
Clear staff workflow
Give the interdisciplinary team a defined referral process instead of relying on informal follow-up.
Improved patient access
Bring psychiatric care closer to where patients already receive ongoing treatment.
Better referral visibility
Track whether referrals resulted in appointments and continued engagement.
Kidney-aware coordination
Support communication that reflects the patient’s medical treatment and dialysis schedule.
Implementation
From first conversation to implementation.
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1
Discovery
Review your current screening process, patient needs, referral barriers, and staffing workflow.
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2
Partnership Design
Define scope, capacity, responsibilities, communication, reporting, and contract terms.
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3
Staff Preparation
Orient the team to referral criteria, consent, documentation, and appointment access.
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4
Program Review
Review utilization, barriers, outcomes, and opportunities to refine the partnership.
Optional as the Partnership Grows
Add support only when it is needed.
These services are not required to begin and can be added after the core partnership is established.
- Additional staff education sessions
- Expanded on-site clinic hours, subject to availability
- Customized reporting requests
- Conversation about additional facility partnerships, as capacity allows
- Workflow consultation for leadership
The Business Case
Three ways forward. Only one closes the loop.
Facility leaders are usually weighing three paths once depression screening becomes a scored clinical measure.
Status Quo
Screen, refer, and hope.
- Positive screens documented with no consistent follow-up pathway
- Measure performance depends on inconsistent outside referrals
- No clinician with renal-psychiatric experience on call
- Depression-related hospitalization and disengagement risk unmanaged
Build Internally
Hire, credential, and manage your own program.
- Recruiting and credentialing a psychiatric clinician from scratch
- Building referral, consent, and documentation workflows internally
- Ongoing program management and compliance overhead
- Single point of failure if that clinician leaves
Partner with Novascend
A defined pathway, live in weeks.
- Closed-loop workflow already mapped to the CMS follow-up pathway
- Renal-psychiatric clinical expertise from day one
- One consistent clinician—not a rotating roster of locums
- Monthly visibility into referrals, appointments, and engagement
Depression is common and frequently undertreated in patients receiving dialysis, and is well documented in the nephrology literature as a contributor to hospitalization, treatment non-adherence, and reduced quality of life. Novascend cannot guarantee specific clinical outcomes, measure scores, or payment results; figures above describe typical practice characteristics, not contractual commitments.
Why Novascend
Psychiatric care informed by dialysis experience.
Novascend is led by a board-certified Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner and Certified Case Manager with approximately ten years of dialysis nursing experience and a background in case management, utilization review, and care coordination. By design, Novascend remains an independent, single-clinician practice— patients and partner facilities work with the same clinician at every visit, with referral volume calibrated in advance to protect that continuity.
“The goal is not to create more work for the dialysis team. It is to create a reliable next step when a patient needs support.”
Common Questions
What facility leaders usually want to know.
Can the partnership be tailored to our facility?
Yes. The partnership can be structured around your facility’s patient population, referral volume, staffing model, technology, and preferred level of clinical support.
Can we start with a pilot before a full rollout?
Yes. Most partnerships begin with a defined pilot cohort or single unit so your team can evaluate the workflow, referral volume, and fit before expanding to additional units or locations.
Is Novascend available for psychiatric emergencies or after hours?
No. Medical and psychiatric emergencies are directed through the facility’s existing emergency protocol—911, 988, or the emergency department—at all times, regardless of hour. Novascend provides scheduled outpatient psychiatric evaluation and follow-up during business hours and is notified of urgent referrals to arrange timely follow-up once the patient is medically stable.
Can Novascend support multiple facilities or a larger health system?
Novascend is an independent, single-clinician practice with a defined monthly capacity. Additional facility partnerships can be discussed as capacity allows, and supporting a larger system or multiple sites may require structural changes that are evaluated case by case before any commitment is made.
Does the facility pay for patient visits?
Eligible patient-facing services may be billed through the patient’s insurance. Coverage and authorization vary. Separate facility fees may apply for implementation, administrative work, reporting, reserved clinic capacity, or training.
Can psychiatric visits occur during dialysis?
Some telehealth follow-up visits may be possible during treatment when privacy, facility policy, technology, patient preference, and clinical appropriateness allow. Comprehensive evaluations may require a separate private appointment.
Does the partnership guarantee CMS compliance or QIP results?
No. Novascend can support screening, referral, follow-up, documentation, and reporting workflows, but it cannot guarantee regulatory compliance, quality scores, coverage, reimbursement, or payment outcomes.
Facility Partnership Inquiry
Let’s discuss a behavioral health pathway your team can realistically sustain.
Tell us a little about your organization, current referral process, and the type of support you are exploring. Novascend will review the inquiry and respond to discuss fit, capacity, and appropriate next steps.