{"id":283590,"date":"2026-02-14T09:03:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-14T09:03:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/283590\/"},"modified":"2026-02-14T09:03:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-14T09:03:09","slug":"kaiser-workers-say-patients-deserve-better-mental-health-care-after-31m-settlement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/283590\/","title":{"rendered":"Kaiser Workers Say Patients Deserve Better Mental Health Care After $31M Settlement"},"content":{"rendered":"

Critics for years have alleged that Kaiser has not maintained adequate provider networks for mental health and substance use disorder care, forcing many patients to pay for health care services out of pocket. Mental health care workers said they first took their concerns to Kaiser management, where they were not addressed, then brought them to the attention of the federal labor agency.<\/p>\n

In a statement, Kaiser attributed the lack of consistent access to care to surges in demand for mental health care treatment over the past six years, triggered by the pandemic.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese challenges made it very difficult for our members to get consistent access to the care they needed when they needed it,\u201d spokesperson Lena Howland said. \u201cWe are committed to reimbursing those members who tried but may have been unable to get timely care from Kaiser Permanente in that time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Workers strike outside of the Kaiser Permanente Oakland Medical Center in Oakland on Oct. 14, 2025. (Martin do Nascimento\/KQED)<\/p>\n

In the midst of a national<\/a> mental health crisis, finding a therapist, especially one who accepts insurance, has become notoriously difficult<\/a> as the field struggles with workforce shortages and low reimbursement rates.<\/p>\n

Kaiser has grappled with these industry-wide challenges for over a decade<\/a>. California regulators have repeatedly cited the company<\/a> for making patients wait too long<\/a> for mental health appointments, ordering Kaiser to address persistent issues.<\/p>\n

The National Union of Healthcare Workers, which represents Kaiser Permanente\u2019s 4,800 mental health professionals in California and Hawaii, said Friday that the health care giant\u2019s proposals in ongoing contract negotiations indicate that patients hoping for shorter wait times and greater access to therapists may expect business as usual.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of our therapists still can\u2019t see patients for weeks at a time,\u201d said Matthew Artz, a union spokesperson. \u201cSome of them can\u2019t \u2018refer out\u2019 to outside providers. And even if Kaiser is increasing its network, it\u2019s doing other things to diminish care.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Critics for years have alleged that Kaiser has not maintained adequate provider networks for mental health and substance…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":283591,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[134,554,555,111,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-283590","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mental-health","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-mental-health","10":"tag-mentalhealth","11":"tag-new-zealand","12":"tag-newzealand","13":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283590","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283590"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283590\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/283591"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283590"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=283590"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=283590"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}