A Closer Look at the U.S. Mental Health Provider Shortage

  • Nov 27, 2024

    The U.S. health care system is currently ill-equipped to meet the high and growing need for behavioral health services, and states need to take efforts to mitigate related workforce shortages, according to a recent report by Georgetown University’s Center on Health Insurance Reforms (CHIR).

    As of August 2024, more than a third of Americans lived in a federally designated mental health professional shortage area. The inadequate behavioral health workforce — referring to a range of clinicians and paraprofessionals who specialize in delivering or supporting mental health and substance use disorder treatments — disproportionately impacts rural and marginalized communities. Over 45% of rural counties across the nation did not have practicing psychologists in 2021, compared to 16% of urban counties.

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    © 2024 MMIT
  • Jinghong Chen

    Jinghong has been producing infographics and data stories on employer-sponsored insurance, public health insurance programs and prescription drug coverage for AIS Health’s Health Plan Weekly and Radar on Drug Benefits since 2018. She also manages AIS Health’s annual executive compensation database for top insurers and Blue Cross and Blue Shield affiliates. Before joining AIS Health, she interned at WBEZ, Al Jazeera English and The New York Times Chinese. She graduated from Missouri School of Journalism with a focus on data journalism and international reporting.

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