Posted on February 5, 2009 15:26
Topics: Mental Health | Parity
Post Type: briefing
From EBRI.org:
Summary
- "This Issue Brief discusses issues in mental health care
benefits. It describes the current state of employment-based mental
health benefits and discusses studies and issues regarding full mental
health parity. It also includes an analysis of the effect of full
mental health parity on the uninsured population and the effects of the
limited mental health parity provision contained in the VA-HUD
appropriations bill. The final section discusses the implications of
mental health parity for health plans and health insurers.
- When employers began to provide health insurance benefits to their
employees and their families, they extended coverage to include mental
health benefits under the same terms as other health care services.
Many employers continued to add mental health benefits through the
1970s and early 1980s until cost pressures required employers to
re-examine all health care benefits that were offered. They quickly
found that, while only a small proportion of the beneficiaries used
mental health care services, the costs associated with this care were
very high. As a result, employers placed limits on mental health
benefits in an attempt to make the insurance risk more manageable.
- The general strategies employers have used to manage their health
care costs are cost sharing, utilization review, managed care, and the
packaging of provider services. Employers' cost management strategies
may be restricted, however. Five states have mental health parity laws,
but three of the states—Rhode Island, Maine, and New Hampshire—apply
these laws only to the seriously mentally ill. In addition, 31 states
mandate that mental health benefits be provided. However, state
mandates apply only to insured plans, not to self-insured employer
plans, which are exempt from state regulation of health plans under the
Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA).
- A number of recent studies have examined the effect of mental
health parity on health insurance premiums in a "typical"preferred
provider organization and on the uninsured. In general, the studies
concluded that mental health parity could increase health insurance
premiums, decrease health insurance coverage for non-mental health
related illnesses, and increase the number of uninsured individuals.
- All studies of mental health parity, and mandated benefits in
general, assume that there is a strong likelihood that increased health
benefit costs would be passed along to workers in the form of higher
cost sharing for health insurance, lower wage growth, or lower growth
in other employee benefits."
Find the Full briefing here: http://ebri.org/publications/ib/index.cfm?fa=ibDisp&content_id=92
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