Mandatory enrollment of medicaid-eligible mentally ill persons in prepaid health plans: The minnesota Demonstration project

HMOs are increasingly being viewed as appropriate service providers for Medicaid program eligibles including, in some cases, the severely mentally ill. The authors describe the approach taken by a Minnesota Medicaid HMO demonstration project with regard to the provision of treatment to mentally ill persons. They describe the structure of the Demonstration, the concerns of community-based mental health providers, the response to these concerns on the part of program officials and the reaction of HMO providers to the inclusion of the mentally ill population in the Demonstration.