UTILIZATION MANAGEMENT ANALYSIS FOR CHILDRENS MENTAL-HEALTH-SERVICES

Efficient identification of high-cost child and adolescent consumers o f public mental health services using existing utilization and cost da ta is illustrated, along with analyses that profile these high-cost co nsumers and demonstrate the effect on total service cost per client of providing case management. The results indicate that providing high l evels of case management services is not correlated with reductions in total service costs and that there is a need in the service system fo r using high-cost case management review techniques to control service utilization and lower costs.