Oklahoma advocates for mental health say the state has made strides in wider access to mental health services for people with SoonerCare, but that's not the case for the about two million Oklahomans on private insurance.  

Accessing mental health services can be an obstacle for Oklahomans with private insurance. One hurdle happens right out of the gate with out-of-date insurance directories with disconnected or incorrect phone numbers for people to call.

The statewide study linked individual stories of people to show a pattern of private insurance dead ends.

"We've heard anecdotes and stories now for many years now. Oklahomans reporting long wait times or expensive out of pocket costs in order to access behavioral health providers," said Zack Stoycoff with the Healthy Minds Policy Initiative. 

Jeff Dismukes, with the Oklahoma Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse added, "Frankly the system just hasn't been working on the private side."

The study done by the Healthy Minds Policy Initiative looked into the three biggest commercial insurance providers in Oklahoma. They followed the steps a customer would go through to access mental health services, and called 159 providers statewide but more often than not got stuck on the starter blocks.

"We could only actually reach about 35% of providers that were listed in the directory. It's potentially impossible in some parts of the state," said Stoycoff. 

"It's absolutely frustrating. You start going down your list. You're playing by the rules. You've paid for your insurance and now you're needing it.. and call after call it's not going through," Dismukes said.

Access to mental health and substance abuse services is even more out of reach for rural Oklahomans.  

Of the 65% of providers who didn't answer their phones, half didn't even call an in-service number. The majority of those who did answer, 65%, couldn't give a timeline of when a provider could be seen. About 30% could see a patient within a month and only 18% met the one-week standard. The report said some of the potential consequences of delayed access are poor academic performance, emergency room visits from overdoses or suicide attempts, unnecessary contact with police, and higher public service costs.

"These diseases, when left untreated, are deadly. This is a significant part of our healthcare system," said Dismukes.  

"People fall through the cracks,”Stoycoff added. “You end up going to the criminal justice system, to jail. They become a provider of last resort. That's why the jails are the number one provider of mental health services."

The report also highlighted that insurance directories only have about a third of available behavioral health providers in-network.

Two bills to address those gaps are expected to be heard this legislative session. SB 254 allows for out-of-network care at no cost when in-network isn't available.  SB 442 requires insurance companies to follow a certain set of standards, like update the directory every thirty days.

To see the full Healthy Minds Study, click here.