We examine the impact of insurance expansion under the Affordable Care Act's Dependent Care Expansion (DCE) on allocation of mental health care across illness severity, types of care and racial/ethnic groups. Evidence suggests that the increase in mental health care utilization resulting from the DCE was restricted to individuals with clinically significant mental health conditions. There is no evidence suggesting that the increase occurred disproportionately in medication-only treatment or that it increased racial/ethnic disparities. The DCE appears to have been successful in increasing utilization of mental health care among a high need group without lowering quality or increasing disparities.

       Access further information on this document at Springer US This article was published outside of RAND. The full text of the article can be found at the link above.

       Research conducted by RAND Health

       This report is part of the RAND Corporation external publication series. Many RAND studies are published in peer-reviewed scholarly journals, as chapters in commercial books, or as documents published by other organizations.

       The RAND Corporation is a nonprofit institution that helps improve policy and decisionmaking through research and analysis. RAND's publications do not necessarily reflect the opinions of its research clients and sponsors.