Am J Psychiatry 1978; 135:735-738
Copyright © 1978 by American Psychiatric Association
The external provision of Health Maintenance Organization mental health services
DJ Muller
The author describes the three ways mental health services may be provided
in a health maintenance organization (HMO)--by an internal department of
psychiatry, by one or more unrelated external autonomous care providers, or
by an external autonomous group of providers. He proposes that the latter
type is the best model, offering many of the advantages of the internal
department while delivering more personalized, higher quality care at lower
cost to the HMO. However, certain conditions must exist, including
convenient location, regular conferences with other HMOR physicians, and
the provision of educational and preventive services, if the superiority of
this model is to be maintained.
