Content by Keyword: Substance Abuse (Alcohol and Drug Abuse)

On February 2, 2010 the Departments of Labor, Treasury and Health and Human Services published Interim Final Rules (IFR) in the  Federal Register . 2  The IFR and the accompanying guidance were meant to help consumers, self-insured employers, insurers, health plans and managed behavioral health organizations (MBHOs) (among other stakeholders)

The 2008 enactment of the MHPAEA represents a new era for coverage of behavioral health conditions. While the law has some exclusions, it is substantially more comprehensive than the previous federal parity law 1  and considerably stronger than most state parity laws.

In general, parity requires that mental health and substance use disorder (MH/SUD) insurance benefits be comparable to and no more restrictive than the benefits for medical-surgical care. Coverage of MH/SUD services has been more limited than most other health services. Restrictions have included annual or lifetime limits on the number of provide

This paper describes analyses commissioned by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to inform the implementation of the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act (MHPAEA) of 2008. This law generally requires that mental health and substance use disorder (MH/SUD) insurance benefits be comparable to the benefits for medical and

The Interim Final Rules (IFR) implementing the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act (MHPAEA) of 2008 went into effect on July 1, 2010. This report describes the findings from short-term studies commissioned by the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)

Drug generic name Drug brand name Restricted and expanded MH/SA medications Restricted and expanded Major Depressive Disorder medications 1 = Restricted 0 = Expanded* 1 = Restricted 0 = Expanded** Donepezel Aricept 1 0 Galantamine Reminyl 1 0 Tacrine

Table C-1. Plan Sampling for MH/SA Use and Total and Out-of-pocket Spending

Site Visits to FEHB Health Plans Conducted through a contract between the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and in conjunction with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management; and subcontracts between ROW Sciences and the University of Maryland School of Medicine, RAND Health, Harvar

Plan Exit Analysis The Generalized Estimating Equations (GEE) model used to estimate the probability of plan exit and the change in this probability from 2000 to 2001 and 2002 was:

Ms. Blasinsky is now at CSR, Inc. Dr. Patton is now at Westat. Dr. Barry is now at Yale University School of Medicine. While at ASPE, Dr. Hennessy initiated the evaluation and served as the initial Government Project Officer. Dr. Hennessy is now at SAMHSA. The PERT term general medical care is used in this paper to dis

Ai, C., & Norton, E. C. (2003). Interaction Terms in Logit and Probit Models. Economic Letters (80): 123-129. Agency for Health Care Policy and Research. (1993). Depression in primary care: volume 2. Treatment of major depression . Rockville, MD: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Agency for Health Care Policy and Research. (

Utilization and Cost Descriptive Analysis of All Enrollees

Descriptive findings on FEHB plans’ parity implementation were obtained using data for two time periods (pre- and post-parity) from the Parity Reporting Requirement (PRR), which was completed by all FEHB plans that remained in the FEHB Program continuously from 1999 to 2002. 37 Findings on FEHB plans’ benefit design changes in response to the

Implementation of the Parity Policy Key Implementation Research Questions Did all FEHB plans comply with the parity policy? How did the FEHB parity policy affect MH/SA benefit design and management? How did the FEHB parity policy affect the benefit design and management for general medical care? Did FEHB plans incur additional expense

This chapter summarizes the evaluation’s major findings on the implementation and impact of the parity policy on mental health and substance abuse (MH/SA) service utilization, cost, and quality. We first present a brief overview of the evaluation’s key research questions and findings. We then highlight the main findings on implementing the FEH

The PERT studied the effect of parity on quality of care for adults by using established standards of care for treating specific disorders, i.e., depression and substance abuse, to create indicators of quality following the methods developed by several investigators (c.f. Berndt et. al 1997; Lehman and Steinwachs, 1998). The methods described in t

Implementing parity required changing the nominal benefits for coverage of treating mental health and substance abuse (MH/SA) disorders. The dimensions of the nominal benefit that are most often affected when parity policies are implemented are:

This chapter addresses the intermediate and long-term impacts of the parity policy on access to care, service use, cost, and quality of care, as illustrated in the evaluation logic model in Figure II-I. The research questions, data sources and collection methods, and analysis methods relating to cost, access, utilization, and quality that we summa