As you may have heard or experienced, NYSHIP’s mental health coverage was abruptly switched from OptumHealth to Value Options last January. It was a switch that was not brought to members’  attention until after the change had been made, which, for many members, had and still has a lot of unexpected consequences: some people have found that their mental health providers are no longer covered by NYSHIP, or that they cannot find a provider in the ValueOption network within a reasonable range of work, home, or school; for some, both are the case. Not everyone can afford to keep their mental health providers without having them in-network, either, which means students have had to break off relationships with the mental health professionals they had become accustomed to working with. The comments in the 2014 DSC Health and Wellness survey The 2014 DSC Health and Wellness survey also includes responses from people who expressed their reluctance to try to get mental health services not because they are uncertain about whether they should seek these services, but because they have heard from others about difficulties and stressful situations associated with this change in health coverage. This response is something we cannot afford when seeking mental health services is still often stigmatized.

We want to emphasize and illustrate how crucial good and consistent mental health care is for surviving and thriving in graduate school. With that in mind, we are searching out long form narratives that explain individuals’ and families’ experiences with mental health care through NYSHIP, specifically the changes and disruptions they may have gone through due to the unannounced shift from OptumHealth to ValueOptions. If you have a story about your experiences with these issues, please send it to us via the website’s contact form or to Jen Prince (ccb@cunydsc.org) or me (wellness@cunydsc.org). We hope to gather these responses into a pamphlet that we can distribute through CUNY campuses. You can stay anonymous as well in these narratives; we won’t publish your name.

Thank you in advance for sharing; while it takes extra time to write up these experiences, your stories help us to make the GC community aware of these issues and to advocate for good, consistent healthcare.