Patterns of Service Utilization among Children in the Child Protection System Under Implementation of Child Welfare Prepaid Mental Health Plan
Abstract
This report profiles efforts to examine the effect of child individual characteristics, child maltreatment histories, diagnoses, and the Child Welfare-Prepaid Mental Health Plan (CW-PMHP) on mental health service utilization.
Children who enter the child protection system represent the greatest users of behavioral health services defined as any mental health, alcohol or drug abuse treatment services (Burns et al., 2004; Leslie et al., 2004; Staudt, 2003), have the highest rates of hospitalization, and have health care costs that are considerably higher compared to other Medicaid eligible children (Takayama, Bergman, & Connel, 1994). To increase effectiveness of mental health services provision, cost efficiency, as well as to better help children in the child protection system, the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration contracted with Magellan Behavioral Health of Florida, Inc. to implement the Child Welfare-Prepaid Mental Health Plan (CWPMHP) in Florida.
To enhance our understanding of children’s mental health service utilization and factors associated with it, we sought to examine the effect of child individual characteristics, child maltreatment histories, diagnoses, and CW-PMHP on mental health service utilization. Therefore, the goals of this study were to examine the effect of individual characteristics (e.g., demographic characteristics, maltreatment histories, and diagnoses) and the effect of the Child Welfare Prepaid Mental Health Plan on mental health service utilization among children placed in out-of-home care. Participants in this study were children in Florida who were placed in out-of-home care during fiscal year 2006-2007 between birth and age 18.
Citation
Yampolskaya, S., Greenbaum, P. E., & Briscoe, R. (2008). Patterns of service utilization among children in the child protection system under implementation of child welfare prepaid mental health plan (Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) series No. 220-118). Tampa, FL: University of South Florida, Louis de la Parte Florida Mental Health Institute.