Healio (6/7) reports studies have “shown that questions about physicians’ mental health on state licensing and credentialing applications often discourage them from seeking mental health treatment.” Such “questions frequently contain stigmatizing language that lead to concerns about potential repercussions to the physicians’ medical licensure if they acknowledge having mental health conditions, according to Saranya Loehrer, MD, MPH, the founder of C3 Collaboratives and a faculty member at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, and Ankita Sagar, MD, MPH, FACP, the system vice president for Clinical Standards and Variation Reduction and Physician Enterprise at CommonSpirit Health.” The two physicians “are working with a national coalition group to remove stigmatizing language regarding mental health on licensing and credentialing applications” as “part of the Dr. Lorna Breen Health Care Provider Protection Act, which was recently signed into law to address the stigma that health care professionals face when seeking mental health services.”
Related Links:
— “Q&A: Physicians call for changes to medical licensing applications, Healio, June 7, 2022