Out-of-Network Spending on Behavioral Health, 2008–2016

Excerpt

Out-of-network spending by patients and payers has gained increasing policy attention, including two recent US Senate proposals to protect patients from high out-of-network costs.^{1, 2} Out-of-network care is particularly common in behavioral health, as mental health providers are less likely to participate in insurer networks.³ The Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act likely increased access to out-of-network behavioral health,⁴ while the opioid epidemic has increased demand for substance use disorder treatment. Despite this, little is known about out-of-network spending for behavioral health over the last decade,⁵ especially whether out-of-network substance use disorder spending has deviated from that of other behavioral health services. …