Bridging the Gap Between Mental Health and Healthcare Management: Celeste Nevarez

Celeste Nevarez, MC, LPC-S is an expert multitasker. During her first semester at the UTHealth Houston School of Public Health in El Paso in 2022, she worked a full-time job, taught college courses, and was planning her wedding. Nevarez is now a second-year student in the inaugural cohort of the executive-style MPH in Healthcare Management. She and her peers are expected to graduate this May as the first cohort to complete this program in El Paso. As she approaches graduation, she is looking forward to utilizing her degree in a way that benefits the behavioral and public health needs of El Paso, the community she calls home.

Nevarez serves as the Chief of Clinical Services at Emergence Health Network, the organization designated as the Local Mental Health Authority and Local Intellectual/Developmental Disabilities Authority in El Paso County. Emergence Health Network offers mental health programs serving more than 30,000 people each year. Nevarez is also a licensed professional counselor supervisor in the state of Texas, with expertise in adolescent issues and the impact of trauma.

“My background prepared me for the MPH in Healthcare Management in that I understand the need for public health literacy and public service announcements regarding accessibility to care,” Nevarez shared. “For communities who are underserved and not aware of the services available to them – coupled with the stigma around behavioral health – a lack of public health literacy can have profound effects.”

Nevarez is passionate about her career and the ten years she’s worked to provide mental health services to patients in the El Paso community. “I love it, I don't think I’ll ever move away from that,” she shared. “I meet other Texas providers and realize – I can’t just do this. I can be a really good therapist, but I can have a broader impact if I look at all the systems and organizations involved. Thinking about this complexity is fascinating to me,” she said. This realization led her to apply to the MPH in Healthcare Management. “We have to work with these systems, rather than operating in silos.”

This will be Nevarez’s second master’s degree, having previously obtained a Master of Counseling from Arizona State University. Before starting the program with UTHealth Houston, she was worried that the healthcare management learning modality would limit the connections and interactions she enjoyed so much during her previous graduate experience. “I like being with people, I have made a career out of it. The healthcare management program in El Paso offered incredible opportunities including guest speakers and meeting new people within the community I've lived in my whole life. And the application-based learning was something I was really happy to see with this program because it's the best way for me to learn,” said Nevarez.

In addition to an interactive environment, learning in a cohort format was nonnegotiable as she contemplated continuing her education. “That was very important to me. My other master's degree was in a cohort format, and I still talk to those people. I still consult with them,” she shared. “I wanted the cohort experience again and so having that here is so exciting.”

As she wraps up the program, Nevarez is combining her background as a mental health provider and the lessons learned through the coursework to champion a new workplace initiative through her practicum. Her final project will outline protocols to implement a Code Lavender, a rapid response and crisis intervention tool to provide support to healthcare professionals after an incident at Emergence Health Network.

“We serve quite a large population of high-acuity clients, and we are the go-to for these clients for mental health services,” Nevarez said. “Code Lavender is about addressing those employees and staff to make sure that they are well too. Yes, we are a service to our community, but our community includes employees. We pride ourselves in being a trauma-informed care organization and this just folds right into the work that we do in making sure our workforce is also cared for.”

As she propels Code Lavender forward, Nevarez draws from some of the most impactful lessons she has learned through the MPH in Healthcare Management program, including  leading with a curious mindset. “You can learn about healthcare - that’s important - but the leadership aspect has been so helpful,” Nevarez said. “I’ve had that ah-ha moment so many times – where I think ‘oh yeah, we always did it like that, I thought that’s how you were supposed to do it.’ But my courses have taught me that there are always new and better ways to do something.”

For other expert multitaskers like her who might be contemplating returning to school after a long break, Nevarez had simple, but encouraging advice: “Do it! Education is an investment that you'll never regret.”