California Department Of Managed Health Care Again Cites Kaiser Permanente Failure To Provide Timely Behavioral Health Appointments

On June 12, 2017, the California Department of Managed Health Care (DMHC), in a routine plan review, cited Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, Inc. for failure to ensure that it provided timely follow-up behavioral health appointments. The DMHC said its review found that the plan did not take effective and timely action when problems were identified for initial behavioral health appointment availability. Further, the plan lacked a process for regularly tracking availability and timeliness of behavioral health follow-up appointments and did not take effective and timely action when it identified problems.

California law requires health maintenance organizations (HMOs) such . . .