U.S. Health System Has Not Met Needs of People with Mental Retardation, Surgeon General Report Says

The U.S. health care system has "failed to respond to changes in the lives of people with mental retardation," and these individuals continue to receive inferior health care, according to a report released Feb. 11 by U.S. Surgeon General David Satcher, NPR's "All Things Considered" reports (Shapiro, "All Things Considered," NPR, 2/11). The report, "Closing the Gap: A National Blueprint to Improve the Health of Persons with Mental Retardation," is the result of a national conference held in Washington, D.C., in December 2001. Participants spent two days discussing problems with health care services for the mentally retarded and suggesting possible solutions. Ideas in the report were also taken from 8,500 public comments submitted to the surgeon general's Web site and at a national listening session held in October 2001. According to the report, people with mental retardation "feel excluded from public campaigns to promote wellness" and face "exceptional challenges in staying healthy." Although a growing number of mentally retarded people no longer live in mental institutions, the report says "neither the education and training of health professionals nor other elements of the nation's health system have been updated to reflect their progress" ("Closing the Gap: A National Blueprint to Improve the Health of Persons with Mental Retardation," 2/11). NPR reports that according to Timothy Shriver, president of the Special Olympics, the "biggest hurdle" in treating people with mental retardation is "simply an old-fashioned problem of low expectations" among providers.

Solutions
According to NPR, the "discovery" of widespread problems with care for the mentally retarded was first made in 1995 when doctors on hand to provide free medical services to Special Olympics participants noticed that 20% of the athletes needed "immediate medical care" ("All Things Considered," NPR, 2/11). The report outlines six "goals and action steps" to improve health care for the mentally retarded:

• Promote health care awareness among the mentally retarded through community events;
• Increase knowledge of health and mental retardation through a national research agenda and improved data collection;
• Identify priority areas and standards of care in health care for the mentally retarded;
• Better train health care providers to treat mentally retarded people;
• Arrange for diverse flexible financing mechanisms; and
• Increase sources of health care for mentally retarded people and ensure easy access ("Closing the Gap: A National Blueprint to Improve the Health of Persons with Mental Retardation," 2/11).