RAND Mental Health Systems Initiative
A resource for improving access to quality mental health services in communities across the country through broad expertise and state-of-the-art methods
RAND Mental Health Systems Initiative
Our Purpose
A fraught regulatory environment, inequities in access to care, insurance complexities and stigma are just a few of the barriers that prevent half of people with mental health conditions from receiving care.
Mental health systems have the potential to solve some of these problems, and RAND is uniquely positioned to help. The RAND Mental Health Systems Initiative is a multidisciplinary team with hundreds of experts that can help you navigate the complexities of policy to provide people with the high-quality, evidence-based mental health care they need.
- Black Americans are more likely to be hospitalized for mental health conditions and less likely to receive outpatient services.
- 1 in 8 visits to the Emergency Department are related to a mental health or substance abuse issue.
- 26 million Americans have untreated mental illness.
- 2 million people with mental illness are treated in prisons which have become one of the largest care providers.
How We Can Help
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A Holistic Approach
We can help you optimize mental health systems to treat the whole person.
Mental health is affected by so much more than one's treatment plan, or lack thereof. Mental health is intertwined with clinical and social factors like homelessness, criminal justice issues, physical disabilities, and many more. That's why RAND approaches mental health delivery problems in ways that consider interdependencies and resource constraints to break down silos and improve outcomes.
We can help you establish metrics.
RAND can establish a baseline, benchmarks, and targets for system improvement.
Featured Work
Veterans Health Administration Mental Health Program EvaluationClient: Veterans Health Administration (VHA)
We can help you bring stakeholders together.
RAND has unique experience leading consensus building exercises to generate buy-in.
Featured Work
Patient-Centered Scalable National Network for Effectiveness Research (Pscanner)Client: Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI)
We can help you analyze policy options.
RAND experts combine policy and behavioral health care knowledge to advise clients on policy solutions.
Featured Work
Behavioral Health in the District of ColumbiaClient: Washington D.C. Public System of Care
We can help you forecast outcomes.
RAND can leverage big data and techniques like machine learning to forecast the impacts of potential policies.
Featured Work
Comprehensive Assessment of Reform Efforts (COMPARE)Clients: A range of individuals, corporations, corporate and philanthropic foundations, and health system stakeholders
We can help you evaluate program and policy impact.
RAND can measure impact on factors like patient outcome improvements, cost savings, and return on investment.
Featured Work
Evaluation of the SAMHSA Primary and Behavioral Health Care Integration (PBHCI) Grant ProgramClient: Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA)
Why RAND?
RAND represents more than 1,000 policy experts in a wide range of disciplines, with unrivaled expertise advising on mental health systems. We are nonprofit, nonpartisan and committed to the public interest. Our published work is available free to the public, expanding each project’s reach and impact.
Photo by Diane Baldwin
Recent Work
Recent Clients
Get in Touch
Let’s start a discussion about how we can work together to solve mental health care problems.
Use this form or send an email to mentalhealth@rand.org.
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