Cited by 546Mental Health Treatment and AccessHealth disparities and outcomesRacial and Ethnic Identity Research

Trends in Racial-Ethnic Disparities in Access to Mental Health Care, 2004–2012

Open access
Cook, Benjamin Lê, Trinh, Nhi-Ha, Li, Zhihui, Hou, Sherry Shu-Yeu, Progovac, Ana M.·2017·Psychiatric Services

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: This study compared trends in racial-ethnic disparities in mental health care access among whites, blacks, Hispanics, and Asians by using the Institute of Medicine definition of disparities as all differences except those due to clinical appropriateness, clinical need, and patient preferences. METHODS: Racial-ethnic disparities in mental health care access were examined by using data from a nationally representative sample of 214,597 adults from the 2004-2012 Medical Expenditure Panel Surveys. The main outcome measures included three mental health care access measures (use of any mental health care, any outpatient care, and any psychotropic medication in the past year). RESULTS: Significant disparities were found in 2004-2005 and in 2011-2012 for all three racial-ethnic minority groups compared with whites in all three measures of access. Between 2004 and 2012, black-white disparities in any mental health care and any psychotropic medication use increased, respectively, from 8.2% to 10.8% and from 7.6% to 10.0%. Similarly, Hispanic-white disparities in any mental health care and any psychotropic medication use increased, respectively, from 8.4% to 10.9% and 7.3% to 10.3%. CONCLUSIONS: No reductions in racial-ethnic disparities in access to mental health care were identified between 2004 and 2012. For blacks and Hispanics, disparities were exacerbated over this period. Clinical interventions that improve identification of symptoms of mental illness, expansion of health insurance, and other policy interventions that remove financial barriers to access may help to reduce these disparities.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1176/appi.ps.201500453

Cites

47 of 47 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • People from culturally and linguistically diverse groups are less likely to engage mental health services than members of the wider population, due to a lack of knowledge of services and how to access them, communication barriers, financial barriers, racism, and culturally insensitive practices.

    “For example, people from culturally and linguistically diverse groups are less likely to engage mental health services than members of the wider population, due to a lack of knowledge of services and how to access them, communication barriers, financial barriers, racism, and culturally insensitive practices [95–97].”

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Research works printed but not linked: 4

  1. [1]Institute of Medicine Unequal Treatment: Confronting Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health Care Washington, DC National Academies Press 2003 25032386
  2. [36]Blanco C Patel SR Liu L National trends in ethnic disparities in mental health care Medical Care 45 1012 1019 2007 18049340
  3. [39]Healthy People 2010 Conference Edition (Online) Washington, DC US Department of Health and Human Services 2000 http://wwwhealthgov/healthypeople/Document/defaulthtm
  4. [57]Leong FT Lau AS Barriers to providing effective mental health services to Asian Americans Mental Health Services Research 3 201 214 2001 11859966

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Cook, B. L., Trinh, N.-H., Li, Z., Hou, S. S.-Y., & Progovac, A. M.
Affiliations
Cambridge Health Alliance (US)
Venue
Psychiatric Services
Published
2017-01-01
Volume
68
Issue
1
Pages
9-16
ISSN
  • 0022-1597 (ISSN-L)
  • 1075-2730
  • 1557-9700
OpenAlex
W2479559945
Cited by
546
References
47
Citations by year
2026: 46 · 2025: 74 · 2024: 94 · 2023: 85 · 2022: 107 · 2021: 59 · 2020: 39 · 2019: 20 · 2018: 15 · 2017: 6
FWCI
21.46
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Psychiatric Services (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
Funders
  • Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (R01HS021486)
  • National Institute of Mental Health (T32MH019733)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Mental Health Treatment and Access
  • Social Sciences › Health › Health disparities and outcomes
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Racial and Ethnic Identity Research
Keywords
racial and ethnic disparities, access to mental health care, black-white disparities, Hispanic-white disparities, psychotropic drug use, outpatient psychiatric care, health care utilization trends, health insurance coverage, financial barriers to care, ethnic minorities
MeSH terms
Adolescent, Adult, Aged, Aged, 80 and over, Black or African American, Female, Health Services Accessibility, Hispanic or Latino, Humans, Male, Mental Health Services, Middle Aged, United States, Healthcare Disparities, Young Adult

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review