The Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently released a report recommending that Medicare include explicit information on covered services for beneficiaries with substance use disorders (SUD) in the Medicare & You publication.
As required by the 2018 Substance Use-Disorder Prevention that Promotes Opioid Recovery and Treatment (SUPPORT) for Patients and Communities Act, the report describes the utilization of mental health and SUD services by Medicare beneficiaries and the types of providers offering these services. In addition, the report examines how the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) provides information to beneficiaries about their coverage for mental health and SUD services. GAO reviewed the fall 2019 and January 2020 editions of Medicare & You--the most widely disseminated source of information on Medicare benefits—and found that neither edition included an explicit and broad description of the covered services available for SUD.