Association of Mental Health Disorders With Health Care Spending in the Medicare Population

Abstract

Importance: The degree to which the presence of mental health disorders is associated with additional medical spending on non-mental health conditions is largely unknown.

Objective: To determine the proportion and degree of total spending directly associated with mental health conditions vs spending on other non-mental health conditions.

Design, setting, and participants: This retrospective cohort study of 4 358 975 fee-for-service Medicare beneficiaries in the US in 2015 compared spending and health care utilization among Medicare patients with serious mental illness (SMI; defined as bipolar disease, schizophrenia or related psychotic disorders, and major depressive disorder), patients with other common mental health disorders (defined as anxiety disorders, personality disorders, and posttraumatic stress disorder), and patients with no known mental health disorders. Data analysis was conducted from February to October 2019.

Exposure: Diagnosis of an SMI or other common mental health disorder.

Main outcomes and measures: Risk-adjusted, standardized spending and health care utilization. Multivariable linear regression models were used to adjust for patient characteristics, including demographic characteristics and other medical comorbidities, using hospital referral region fixed effects.

Results: Of 4 358 975 Medicare beneficiaries, 987 379 (22.7%) had an SMI, 326 991 (7.5%) had another common mental health disorder, and 3 044 587 (69.8%) had no known mental illness. Compared with patients with no known mental illness, patients with an SMI were younger (mean [SD] age, 72.3 [11.6] years vs 67.4 [15.7] years; P < .001) and more likely to have dual eligibility (633 274 [20.8%] vs 434 447 [44.0%]; P < .001). Patients with an SMI incurred more mean (SE) spending on mental health services than those with other common mental health disorders or no known mental illness ($2024 [3.9] vs $343 [6.2] vs $189 [2.1], respectively; P < .001). Patients with an SMI also had substantially higher mean (SE) spending on medical services for physical conditions than those with other common mental health disorders or no known mental illness ($17 651 [23.6] vs $15 253 [38.2] vs $12 883 [12.8], respectively; P < .001), reflecting $4768 (95% CI, $4713-$4823; 37% increase) more in costs for patients with an SMI and $2370 (95% CI, $2290-$2449; 18.4% increase) more in costs for patients with other common mental health disorders. Among Medicare beneficiaries, $2 686 016 110 of $64 326 262 104 total Medicare spending (4.2%) went to mental health services and an additional $5 482 791 747 (8.5%) went to additional medical spending associated with mental illness, representing a total of 12.7% of spending associated with mental health disorders.

Conclusions and relevance: In this study, having a mental health disorder was associated with spending substantially more on other medical conditions. These findings quantify the extent of additional spending in the Medicare fee-for-service population associated with a diagnosis of a mental health disorder.

Figure 1.. Risk-Adjusted Mean Spending Associated With Medical Services vs Mental Health Services Among Patients With and Without Mental Health Disorders

Figure 2.. Risk-Adjusted Spending Associated With Additional Mental Health Services vs Medical Services

Whiskers represent 95% CIs.