Managed care and fee discounts in psychiatry: New evidence

This article describes the extent of managed care and fee discounting in ps ychiatric practice using data on 970 randomly sampled American Psychiatric Association members from the 1996 National Survey of Psychiatric Practice. Seventy percent of psychiatrists were found to have some patients in manage d behavioral health care programs. The survey data illustrate that psychiat rists' involvement in managed care spans primary practice settings and is f airly evenly distributed across regions of the United States. Nationally, p sychiatrists discount fees for 35% of their patients, with significant vari ation by practice type and extent of involvement in managed behavioral heal th care. The average level of discount is 25% with little variation by prac tice type or extent of involvement in managed behavioral health care. There is little evidence that psychiatrists with patients in managed care have h igher fee levels than psychiatrists with no patients in managed care.