2021 COVID-19 Mental Health Services Impact Report

Medical claims yield valuable insights into mental health services trends.

In order for healthcare organizations to create healthier communities, they need insight into more than clinical patient information. They also need to see behavioral health data, which is a major indicator of risk and trends for their population. Having access to this information can feed into more effective preventative and community-based mental health services and treatments for patients.

There’s no denying the fact that the COVID-19 crisis has significantly impacted global health and the way healthcare is delivered over the past year. Primarily this has been seen in the speedy transition from inpatient care to telehealth appointments with care providers. The jump in remote healthcare spiked dramatically within just a year and a half. The nationwide expansion of telehealth has helped providers and patients maintain continuity of care and support social distancing requirements. Communities have benefited from vital services that reduce potential care gaps and limit patient exposure.

It has also affected trends in mental health services, with many telehealth services being provided for a rise in behavioral health needs, including for new patients seeking treatment that had not been treated for issues such as anxiety, depression and substance abuse before.

LexisNexis Risk Solutions leveraged data from billions of aggregated de-identified medical claims pulled from in LexisNexis MarketView™ to understand mental health trends from December 2019 through February 2021 during the heart of the pandemic. Our experts pulled insights from all of medical claims relevant to the treatment of mental health disorders.

Our experts evaluated eight key mental health metrics to identify trends both prior to and during the pandemic to help understand the impact COVID-19 has had on mental health services. This ebook examines these metrics and shows how the data points to an increase in use of behavioral health services and the use of telehealth options for mental health care. To learn more, download the full report.