Mental Health Policy Analysis

This article discusses the Mental Health Reform Act of 2016 (S. 2680) and its provisions for early intervention, parity, and holistic treatment. It covers the historical background, reason behind the policy, and social thought and ideology regarding this policy.

Running head: MENTAL HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS
Mental health policy analysis
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author’s Note:

1MENTAL HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS
Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................2
Historical background................................................................................................................2
Reason behind the policy...........................................................................................................3
Description of the policy............................................................................................................4
Social thought and ideology regarding this policy.....................................................................7
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................8
Definition of Key Terms............................................................................................................9
References................................................................................................................................10

2MENTAL HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS
Introduction
Mental health is a state of mind which affects an individual’s feeling, thinking and
mood. This can in turn affect someone’s ability to perform necessary daily activities and
logical and cognitive ability. Mental health is very difficult to treat every individual suffers
different experience even if they are suffering from the same disease or have same diagnosis
(Andrade et al., 2014). Still today there is a social stigma around mental health as admitting
having mental problem sometime perceives as weak and feeble mentality. This does not help
the current situation either and as a direct consequence mental health is emerging as a global
prevalence now a day (Ramchand et al., 2015). Hence, there is a growing need of treating and
prevention of this prevalence before it is too late.
The situation in United States in America is no different than the other countries.
Almost one out of five American is suffering from mental illness as of right now. Current
healthcare situation and policies are not helping this situation any better (Williams et al.,
2015). Hence, a need of better policies and prevention tactics is needed from the government.
Fortunately for the people of America, government have listened to the public outcry of the
situation and passed a bill in the house named H.R. 34, the 21st Century Cures Act, Nov. 30,
2016. This bill includes two provisions regarding mental health. One of them is Helping
Families in Mental Health Crisis Act of 2016 (H.R. 2646) and another is known as Mental
Health Reform Act of 2016 (S. 2680). Therefore, in this article, historical background, reason
behind the formation of this policy, description of this policy and social thought and ideology
regarding this policy will be discussed thoroughly.

3MENTAL HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS
Historical background
Senators Bill Cassidy (R-LA) and Chris Murphy (D-CT) had proposed the Mental
Health Reform Act of 2016 (S. 2680) in the senate. The bill was placed on the Committee on
Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions with a favourable report on 03/16/2016 with
suggestion for amendment after read twice in front of the committee on the previous day. The
amendment regarding this bill was reported by Senator Alexander which was substitute in
nature. The bill then placed before the Senate Legislative Calendar on 04/26/2016 under
general order with the calendar number 437. The progress and approval of the bill was
actively supported, promoted and lobbied by the National Alliance on Mental Illness
(NAMI), United States of America’s largest organisation for mental health working at the
grass root level. NAMI have signed petition, collected signature, sent emails and thousands
and thousands of tweet to the government to pass the bill. Fortunately, the bill was signed
into law as part of H.R. 34, the 21st Century Cures Act, Nov. 30, 2016 on 13th December,
2016 by that time United States of America President Mr. Barrack Obama (Actions - S.2680 -
114th Congress (2015-2016): Mental Health Reform Act of 2016, 2018).
Reason behind the policy
One out of five American is a victim of mental illness. Although, mental illness is
curable, the prevalence of mental health is getting higher by the day. In the last few years, the
suicide rate in America is highest amongst the last 30 years. Along with that, suicide also
leading contributor of death count in America. Despite being a curable disease almost half
American could not be able to avail the mental health care treatment. Furthermore, mental
health care plan is restricted by the various health insurance plan provided by the private
organisation. This is also one of the primary reason of the unavailability of mental health care
treatment by majority of Americans. Hence, there was immediate and necessary action

4MENTAL HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS
needed from the government. Fortuitously, government had listened to this emerging
necessity and passed the act for the prevention, treatment and promotion of mental health.
Description of the policy
The Mental Health Reform Act of 2016 (S. 2680) is an important and necessary step
towards strengthening United States of America’s mental health system. The primary
objective of this policy is to strengthening and advancing of mental health in United States of
America with the federal help. This will authorize program with the aim of early screening
and intervention system specially to keep the children in school. This policy will also take
part in promotion for evidence based initiative to acknowledge and address the mental health
before it is declined to advanced stage. This policy also encourages the family involvement
and provisional support while strictly and stringently maintaining the privacy of the
individuals while prioritizing and planning of community based services to reduce the rate of
homelessness and incarceration. Additionally, this policy aims to support and provide parity
guidance while also funding for the mental health services. Furthermore, this policy aims to
hire more workforce related to behavioural health and people who had live experience in this
regard. They will be the vital and necessary part of support and care team whose objective
will be to provide recovery to the needed individuals (S.2680 - 114th Congress (2015-2016):
Mental Health Reform Act of 2016, 2018).
Around half people who are suffering from mental health in United States in America
does not get the treatment required because of lack of mental health workforce. As mentioned
in the above paragraph, The Mental Health Reform Act of 2016 (S. 2680) will increases the
trained medical professionals to help the situation. Along with that it will also forms a
minority fellowship program with the objective of to increase the number of qualified and
culturally competent mental health professionals. This policy also increase grant amount for

5MENTAL HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS
the training of mental health professionals. Incidentally, people living in remote area could
not able avail the services provided by mental healthcare system because of their location.
Along with that there are people who are unable to consult with technical professional due to
working hour as they just do not have the time to travel. To address this issues, The Mental
Health Reform Act of 2016 (S. 2680) will also dedicate grant for the tele- health where this
individual can have access to the modern and updated mental health care system (S.2680 -
114th Congress (2015-2016): Mental Health Reform Act of 2016, 2018).
Mental health care were denied or restricted at higher rate than any other health sector
despite being the presence of federal parity law. The Mental Health Reform Act of 2016 (S.
2680) will enhance and strengthen the enforcement of the ‘Mental Health Parity Law’. This
will force the health plan providers to be held accountable for the coverage they have paid for
the services. This policy will audit and report the any plan with more than five parity
violation to the congress. This policy will ensure the interagency action plan to enforce and
enhance parity and a GAO parity study will be investigated (S.2680 - 114th Congress (2015-
2016): Mental Health Reform Act of 2016, 2018).
Amongst the mental health sufferer, almost half the people shows symptoms or illness
by the age of 14. This calls for an early intervention plan to proper and justly tackle the
situation. The Mental Health Reform Act of 2016 (S. 2680) will invest heavily on the early
intervention, so that individual have the access to the proper mental health care treatment
plan before it is too late for them. This policy will allocate five per cent of total mental health
fund which will then support the evidence based initiatives ( like FEP or First Episode
Psychosis programs) addressing the early intervention for the mental illness. Additionally, it
will also allocate grant for the early intervention plan and programs for children (S.2680 -
114th Congress (2015-2016): Mental Health Reform Act of 2016, 2018).

6MENTAL HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS
Furthermore, the Mental Health Reform Act of 2016 (S. 2680) policy will help in
integration of mental health care system with total health. This will provide a holistic
treatment to an individual not just the treatment of a single condition. To achieve this
objective, the policy will support the training of medical professionals and social volunteers
to provide integrated services in the underserved area for mental health care. The policy will
also responsible for the creation of fund to support integrated health care services like
behavioural and primary health (S.2680 - 114th Congress (2015-2016): Mental Health
Reform Act of 2016, 2018).
Moreover, the Mental Health Reform Act of 2016 (S. 2680) help to strengthen the
community crisis system, so that individual with mental illness can avail the mental
healthcare treatment sooner before their situation deteriorates further. To accomplish this
objective the policy will allocate grant to augment the community crisis response service for
the people with need and to maintain and develop the databases related to the mental health
and mental health providing facilities for crisis stabilization (S.2680 - 114th Congress (2015-
2016): Mental Health Reform Act of 2016, 2018).
Along with that, the Mental Health Reform Act of 2016 (S. 2680) help the liaison
between organisation and institution in the related field. This policy requires that an
independent process to be created by the Secretary of Health and Human Services for
complaints and grievance against Protection and Advocacy for Individuals with Mental
Illness Program (PAIMI). This policy has also removed the restriction placed on the PAIMI.
This policy also permits the payment for the individual aged between 22 to 64 years old
receiving treatment at Medicaid managed care organizations (MCOs). But their stay in the
institution has to short term which is no more than fifteen days per month (S.2680 - 114th
Congress (2015-2016): Mental Health Reform Act of 2016, 2018).

7MENTAL HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS
With respect to the National Mental Policy Laboratory (NMHPL), Mental Health
Reform Act of 2016 (S. 2680) has no particular and differentiable comparison. However, the
duties and responsibilities mentioned in this policy were influenced by the NMHPL. This
policy has acknowledged many problems that need to be acknowledged to fix the United
States of America’s mental health system. Interestingly, this policy aims to authorize funding
for many new provisions but the funding must be appropriated by Congress in their annual
budget. This means the Congress have just authorized the funding but have not provided the
funds just yet. Additionally, this bill have not addressed the issues how the poor will receive
the treatment for their mental illness. Hence, this policy is right step towards the addressing
of the issues of mental health but still needs few tweaks and tunings to be work better.
Social thought and ideology regarding this policy
The social situation, ideology and thought have been given to this policy are includes
parity, equality and holistic approach of treatment. The term parity can be defined as a state
where every individual are equally treated despite their economic, financial and cultural
status (Peled, 2015). Social parity is important in any particular society so that every
individual can have equal shot at the treatment. In this case, the Mental Health Reform Act of
2016 (S. 2680) will act upon and strengthen the ‘Mental Health Parity Law’ which will
monitor the service provided by the insurance provider against the coverage amount paid by
the individual. This will help lessen the burden on the economically troubled family and not
just rich people will have the luxury of the treatment for mental health. Another aspect that
this policy addressed that the holistic approach to an individual’s health. The holistic
approach to health can be defined as the approach by which treatment aims to cure all the
aspects related to individual’s health including physical and mental health and not just
treating a singular symptoms or disease. The Mental Health Reform Act of 2016 (S. 2680)

8MENTAL HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS
targets to integrate mental health treatment with the physical health treatment which aims to
providing holistic treatment for an individual’s health. . By doing this, this policy will help
the individuals suffering from mental with total care for both mental and physical health and
not just the mental health. The Mental Health Reform Act of 2016 (S. 2680) also aims to
bring equality amongst the social populace. Equality can be defined as equal access to the all
the privilege provided the government despite an individual’s economic, financial and
cultural status (Peled, 2015). This objective will help poor American to receive mental health
care support and treatment as half of mentally ill people in America belongs in economically
challenged environment.
Conclusion
Henceforth, from the above discussion, it can be inferred that mental health is a global
problem in today’s situation. United States of America is also suffering from the same fate as
almost one out of five people in America suffering from mental illness. Half of them are
unable to access to the mental health care system despite being treatment and cure available
for a particular illness due to their socio- economic status. This needed a government
intervention to handle the situation and with this in mind United States Government have
introduced the Mental Health Reform Act of 2016 (S. 2680). This policy have aim to reduce
the disparity, inequality in the society receiving mental health treatment. Furthermore, this
will also work to intervene and promote the mental health problem. However, this policy is
not perfect and foolproof as it has some drawbacks. Most major drawback of this policy is
that it has just mentioned the objective and not the procedure. This policy does not mentioned
how the poor American will receive treatment for mental health. Therefore, to conclude, it
can be said that the jury is still out about the usefulness of this policy but it is definitely

9MENTAL HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS
needed few more tuning and tweaks and it is a right step forward towards the handling the
situation of mental health in United States of America.

10MENTAL HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS
Definition of Key Terms
Medicaid managed care organisations
(MCOs):
Organisation managed by state Medicaid
agency which accepts a set payment.
Mental health/illness: Disease which causes thought and
behavioural inability to handle daily
activities.
Senate: Upper chamber of United States Congress
Legislative calendar: Calendar used to plan the daily business of
legislative session
Holistic approach: Total treatment approach including physical
and mental
Equality: Equal access to healthcare system
irrespective of creed, culture, gender or
belief.
Parity: Equal treatment irrespective of creed, culture,
gender or belief.
Prevalence: Occurrence rate in a particular area or a
certain period of time.
GAO: United States Government Accountability
Office
Evidence based approach: Medical treatment approach which are
backed by scientific research evidence.
Intervention: Action engaged to mend a medical disorder.
Behavioural health: Well- being related to emotions and
behaviours of an individual.

11MENTAL HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS
References
Actions - S.2680 - 114th Congress (2015-2016): Mental Health Reform Act of 2016. (2018).
Retrieved from https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/senate-bill/2680/actions
Andrade, L. H., Alonso, J., Mneimneh, Z., Wells, J. E., Al-Hamzawi, A., Borges, G., ... &
Florescu, S. (2014). Barriers to mental health treatment: results from the WHO World
Mental Health surveys. Psychological medicine, 44(6), 1303-1317.
Peled, Y. (2015). Parity in the plural: Language and complex equality. Language Problems
and Language Planning, 39(3), 282-297.
Ramchand, R., Rudavsky, R., Grant, S., Tanielian, T., & Jaycox, L. (2015). Prevalence of,
risk factors for, and consequences of posttraumatic stress disorder and other mental
health problems in military populations deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. Current
psychiatry reports, 17(5), 37.
S.2680 - 114th Congress (2015-2016): Mental Health Reform Act of 2016. (2018). Retrieved
from https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/senate-bill/2680/text
Williams, E. P., Mesidor, M., Winters, K., Dubbert, P. M., & Wyatt, S. B. (2015).
Overweight and obesity: prevalence, consequences, and causes of a growing public
health problem. Current obesity reports, 4(3), 363-370.