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Depression Treatment Expenditures for Adults in the USA: a Systematic Review

  • Mood Disorders (E Baca-Garcia, Section Editor)
  • Published:
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Abstract

Purpose of Review

We review 2016–2019 peer-reviewed literature which summarizes the factors contributing to high expense of treating depression among adults in the USA, and interventions that have been conducted to decrease depression treatment expenditures.

Recent Findings

Treatment expenditures associated with depression are high and growing, driven in part by increased health care utilization and a shift toward increased insurance coverage of medications and therapies. The majority of identified articles describe the elevated financial burden associated with treating individuals with chronic medical conditions who also have a depression diagnosis. The few available studies documenting health care system-level interventions identify that multi-target treatment for comorbid illness, collaborative care management, and integration of psychiatric treatment into primary care show promise for reducing depression treatment expenditures.

Summary

Additional research is needed to identify innovative, cost-effective state, and federal payer-initiated depression treatment models, and evaluation of collaborative care and integrated care models implemented to scale across multiple health care systems.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Health Equity Research Laboratory, Department of Psychiatry, Cambridge Health Alliance, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Aaron Samuel Breslow, Nathaniel M. Tran, Frederick Q. Lu & Benjamin Lê Cook

  2. PRIME Center for Health Equity, Psychiatry Research Institute at Montefiore Einstein, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, NY, USA

    Aaron Samuel Breslow, Jonathan E. Alpert & Benjamin Lê Cook

  3. Department of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Benjamin Lê Cook

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  1. Aaron Samuel Breslow
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Aaron Samuel Breslow.

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Conflict of Interest

Aaron Samuel Breslow, Nathaniel M. Tran, Frederick Q. Lu, and Benjamin Lê Cook declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

Jonathan Alpert is a consultant for GLG consulting; grant funding from Otsuka Pharmaceuticals, Axome Therapeutics, and the Patient Centered Research Outcomes Institute (PCORI); payment for manuscript from Belvior Publications through Editorial Fees; and is the Chair of American Psychiatric Association Council on Research.

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Breslow, A.S., Tran, N.M., Lu, F.Q. et al. Depression Treatment Expenditures for Adults in the USA: a Systematic Review. Curr Psychiatry Rep 21, 105 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11920-019-1083-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11920-019-1083-3

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