Majority of Mental Illness of Cases Go Untreated

Fewer than 33% of people with "serious depression or anxiety disorder" receive proper medical treatment, and mental illness treatment shortfalls are "especially striking" for blacks, the elderly and the young, a recent study conducted by researchers at UCLA and Rand Corp., found. The Los Angeles Times reports that the study, published in the January issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry, interviewed 1,636 people with a "strong likelihood of suffering" from mental illness about their mental state and any treatment they had received. While 83% of respondents with depression or an anxiety disorder had seen health care providers during the year preceding the interview, only 30% received care for psychological disorders. Those with mental illnesses who visited mental health specialists were more likely to receive care than those who saw a primary care physician, as 90% of the former were treated compared to 19% of the latter. Those "least likely" to receive care were blacks, men, those younger than 30 or older than 59 and people with "less than a high school education." In addition, the study found that health insurance coverage "made little difference" in the rates of appropriate care because reasons for the problem range from embarrassment to "poor availability of treatment." Often, people do not "recognize ... they have a condition that needs treatment." The study concluded that doctors need to "do a much better job