An Analysis of Mental Health Parity

In lieu of an abstract, below is the first paragraph of the paper. The issue of parity for mental health insurance coverage is a complicated one, involving not only health care, but politics, economics, and moral and ethical questions as well. From a nursing perspective, separating a patient\u27s mental wellness from his or her physical wellness directly contradicts the critical nursing value of holistic health care. From the perspective of mental health advocacy organizations, and from those suffering from mental health disorders, this purposeful disregard of mental illnesses is viewed as discrimination. For certain groups within the federal government and for the insurance companies, mental heath parity is seen as prohibitively costly to the insurance industry and to employers. In order to sort through these different perspectives, it is helpful to look at the recent history of the mental health parity movement