THE ECONOMICS OF PAIN - MENTAL-HEALTH-CARE COSTS AMONG MINORITIES

The provision of high-quality health and mental health services to the ethnic minority populations of the United States is a great concern for the helping professions. Access of ethnic minorities to the mental health care system is limited by issues such as costs and insurance coverage; patterns of service use; and sociocultural factors such as level of acculturation, relationship between poverty and psychiatric illnesses, and social class of origin. Both the health care industry as well as federal and state governments face these challenges with perspectives that only a sound public policy can make more workable and adequate to contemporary times. The role of service providers, the kinds of professional services delivery, diagnostic practices, interactions between primary care physicians and psychiatrists, the care of the chronically mentally ill individual, Medicaid and Medicare coverage, and overcoming cultural and language barriers are some of the many parameters to be confronted when alleviating the economic and human costs of mental health care to minorities.