Not being a clinician myself, I often rely on my students and readers to make sure I don’t miss important developments. Pete Quily, an adult ADD coach, brought the issue of mental health parity to my attention. Thanks for the heads up, Pete!
What is mental health parity? This is an effort to make health insurance coverage of mental health conditions more in line with coverage of medical and surgical services.
The Senate passed S. 558 unanimously on September 18, and now the House is considering H.R. 1424. I encourage you to read about these bills. Click here for another useful description of mental health parity from the US Department of Health and Human Services. There are a number of tables that show the current status of mental health parity in the US. This pie chart is from the SAMHSA site as well.
If you support them, consider calling or writing your representatives or use the toll-free Parity Hotline: 1-866-parity4 (1-866-727-4894). This hotline will allow you to leave a message for your representatives.
Personally, I need to do some more research before deciding how I feel on this issue. Of course, we all want the best care possible for people with psychological disorders. But some of these well-intentioned changes have repercussions that are serious and negative, like daily limits on costs that work in substance abuse, but not in heart surgery.
Apparently, C.H.A.D.D., the major advocacy group for people with AD/HD, has designated today (December 7th) as a Parity Call-in Day. They have a rather old (2001) document on parity on their site, but a search using the term “parity” and a look at their press releases didn’t provide any information about the call-in. Come on, guys! Karen, our resident PR guru chez Freberg, would not approve.
