Advocacy Alert from DBSA

Please consider submitting your story. Many folk are living and suffering with little or no mental health care services.Thank you!

From: "Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance" <webmaster@DBSAlliance.org>

Subject: How's Your Health Insurance Working? The White House Wants to Know.

Date: August 23, 2016 at 10:44:50 AM CDT

Thank you for your past support of mental health parity issues. As a result of your advocacy, several years ago Congress passed the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Act. This important legislation has improved access to mental health care for thousands of Americans by ensuring that that their health insurance plan provides the same benefits for mental health services as it does for other physical conditions. The journey toward this legislative success was long, but your interest in working with DBSA was key. Today, we continue to work with our government and other advocacy partners to ensure full implementation of this important law. One way we do this is by asking plan beneficiaries (like yourself!) to share their story with the White House Parity Task Force. They want to hear what's working well and what's not working such as does your plan: Have higher co-payments or a separate deductible for mental health providers require prior authorization for mental health care but not for med/surg care deny care because the treatment was not medically necessary   place restrictions on the geographic location of care but does not for med/surg care require a less expensive form of treatment be tried before you can move forward with the care plan you and your clinician have developed for you. SHARE YOUR STORY Sharing your story will help policy makers identify best practices and ensure better compliance among all the insurance plans. Your story—good or bad—will help others. The deadline for sharing your story is August 31. So please act today! Please subscribe to the DBSA Advocacy website to continue to receive communications from us about this and other important issues.

Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance 55 E. Jackson Blvd., Suite 490 Chicago, IL 60604 (800) 826-3632 Unsubscribe