Abstract
This study estimated the effects of a waitlist policy on the monthly number and case mix of admissions to state psychiatric hospitals (SPHs) in North Carolina (NC). Descriptive analyses compared pre/postwaitlist differences in the monthly number and case mix of nonforensic adult admissions (N=72,035) to NC's four SPHs by using data from the three years before and the three years after the waitlist announcement. Hospital-level fixed-effects regression models further evaluated the waitlist policy's impact on the number and case mix of admissions. Regression results confirmed that the waitlist policy was associated with both fewer admissions and changes to the case mix of admissions, including a 4.2% decrease in the percentage of monthly admissions by patients with diagnoses of substance abuse disorders (p=.002) across all months postwaitlist (partially offset by an increase of patients with diagnoses of severe mental illness alone). Waitlists led to reduced monthly admissions and altered case mix following implementation at NC SPHs.
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