With the withering of the news business in recent years, nonprofit news organizations are proliferating.  One of the best at digging into a specific news issue is the nonprofit ProPublica.

The City of Fishers has brought the issue of mental health front and center ever since Scott Fadness took office as the city’s first (and so far, only) mayor in 2015.  Mental health has also been receiving a lot more attention from the media in recent years, with the bottom line message that your mental health is just as important as your physical health.

There has been much written about the shortage of qualified therapists.  But ProPublica has taken that issue even one step further.  With the recent focus on health care networks, many therapists entering the field wanting to help those needing it the most are finding that health networks often setup a system that will not allow the therapists to treat patients in need.

Many are leaving the health networks, which increases the cost of therapy for individual patients.

I would encourage you to read this important first part of the ProPublica series on mental health, at this link.