Employees with mental health conditions struggle to get care
Despite an ongoing national emphasis on wellness, workers with mental health conditions are twice as likely as those without to report unmet mental health needs, according to a new survey. This finding stands as a stark reminder that even employees with insurance struggle to receive effective mental health treatment.
The survey, conducted by the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) and released Monday by the Path Forward Coalition of health care purchasers, clinician associations, health systems, philanthropists, and health-related nonprofits, is based on responses from 3,100 employees in the United States ranging in age from 20 to 74 who are covered by their own (or their spouse’s or parent’s) employer-based health plan. About 165 million Americans receive insurance through an employer — either their own or a family member’s.
“By surveying the U.S. workforce, we are taking important steps to go in-depth and find out about the health care benefit experience of workers as it relates to mental health,” Paul Fronstin, director of health benefits research at EBRI, said in a statement.
Related: Employers brace for highest health cost increase in 15 years
Key findings of the “2025 EBRI Employee Mental Health Survey” include the following:
• More than 1 in 4 workers (27%) report they or someone on their health plan has a mental health condition. These individuals are more likely to be between 25 and 54 years old, more often married with children, and more often employed at smaller companies.
• People are struggling to get care — especially mental health care. Respondents reporting a mental health condition were twice as likely as those reporting no mental health condition to be unable to get medical care, tests, or treatment they or a doctor believed necessary over the past six months. One in three respondents reporting a mental health condition say they struggle to get mental health or behavioral health care (33%) and prescriptions (32%). That’s more than twice the rate of those who did not report mental health conditions. A doctor’s refusal to accept their insurance was nearly twice as likely to be cited as the main barrier to care by respondents with a mental health condition compared to those without. Lack of time off of work and childcare were also major barriers.
• Emergency room use is high. Nearly two-thirds (62%) of respondents with a mental health condition visited the ER in the past six months. They were 50% more likely than those who did not report a mental health condition to use emergency care, twice as likely to visit the emergency department three times, and four times as likely to visit four times in a six-month period.
• Three conditions among those most cited by respondents. Anxiety (17%), depression (11%), and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) (8%) arere the most frequently reported conditions.
This snapshot of worker experiences backs widely reported population surveys by the National Alliance on Mental Illness showing nearly half of Americans with mental health fail to get the care they need, EBRI and Path Forward Coalition officials noted.
“Even with insurance from an employer, getting mental health care is much too hard,” said Anna Bobb, executive director of the Path Forward Coalition. “We need to make preventative care available early for mental health conditions, just like we do for other common chronic diseases. The ER shouldn’t be frontline treatment for mental health any more than it should be frontline treatment for heart disease.”