Behavioral Health Prime for Consolidation in 2025, But Regulatory Uncertainty Looms

After years of stagnation, behavioral health providers are actively seeking growth opportunities and finally warming up to more M&A. The uptick in deal flow is evident in even the first month of the year. Behavioral health platform company Oceans Healthcare announced the purchase of Haven Behavioral Healthcare in early January, and Iris Telehealth closed a […]

Trump Administration’s Reaction to Parity Lawsuit Will Have Massive Ramifications for Behavioral Health Care

This is an exclusive BHB+ story A health insurance industry group has sued the Trump administration with the hope of undoing the latest parity-enforcement rule. Filed Jan. 17., the suit argues that the Biden administration’s rule oversteps what current parity law actually allows, violates health plans’ due process rights and runs afoul of federal rulemaking […]

[UPDATED] Federal Funding Freeze Attempt, Medicaid Portal Outage Signal ‘Systemic Risks’ for Behavioral Health Providers

Behavioral health providers have faced regulatory uncertainty regarding government funding and access to Medicaid this week. The Trump administration issued a funding freeze on Monday only for it to be blocked by a federal judge on Tuesday. States reported outages to the Medicaid portal on Tuesday and more interruptions on Wednesday, while the White House […]

In Competitive Funding Landscape, Behavioral Health Upstarts Must Outlast the ‘Walking Dead’

This is an exclusive BHB+ story Once investor darlings, budding behavioral health companies have found it more difficult to raise funds over the last two years. In 2021 and 2022, venture dollars were flowing freely into the space. Rock Health reported that investors poured a staggering $4.9 billion into behavioral health in 2021. In comparison, […]

Population Health Management Could Be the Next Frontier for Behavioral Health Reimbursement

Behavioral health is still largely stuck in the fee-for-service reimbursement model, but industry insiders have hung their hopes on value-based care changing that paradigm. Still, this shift may just be the first step in behavioral health’s reimbursement evolution. Population health management could stand as the future of behavioral health beyond value-based care, which payers often […]

Recent Optum Behavioral Health Rate Cuts Bring to Life Harsh Reality of the Payer-Provider Complex

Over the last few months, we’ve watched Optum pull back on behavioral health funding on multiple fronts. While substantive to the specific sectors impacted, it signals that previous worries about payers cutting back on behavioral health reimbursements are warranted. In short, that’s bad news. But it’s not unexpected. Why is that? Because payers are largely […]

Why Only 44% of Chronic Pain Patients Get Adequate Mental Health Support

More than 50 million Americans suffer from chronic pain. Behavioral health conditions, including mental health and substance use disorders (SUD), are highly prevalent among those with chronic pain. In fact, 56% of U.S. adults with chronic pain have clinically significant anxiety or depression symptoms. And yet, a “staggering” share of this group does not receive […]

A 6-Point Behavioral Health Holiday Wishlist

I’ve softened on my no-holiday-music-before-Thanksgiving rule. The nostalgia has become too powerful to resist. Plus, I’m coming to appreciate much more the latent hope for a better world that imbues the spirit of these tunes — even if that spirit is cheaply laced into pop music industry-driven schlocky original songs or uninspired rehashes of classics. […]