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Behavioral Health Workforce Tracker (Archived)

The Behavioral Health Workforce Tracker is a customizable interactive map that allows you to visualize the geographic distribution of the behavioral health workforce by provider type and by Medicaid acceptance status. Go to the tracker.
 
The map uses novel data sources: IQVIA Xponent, to identify prescribers of behavioral health medications (psychiatrists, addiction medicine specialists, primary care physicians, advanced practice providers, and other physicians); and state licensure data, to identify psychologists, licensed clinical social workers, licensed professional counselors, and licensed marriage and family therapists. 

Use the Behavioral ​Health Workforce Tracker to:

  • See state variation in the strength of the behavioral health workforce. For example, states with the highest supply of psychiatric and addiction medicine specialists relative to population are in the Northeast. In contrast, the states with the highest supply of counselors and therapists relative to population are concentrated in the mountain states.
  • Drill down to the county level to find out if your county is one of the 1,493 counties in the U.S. (50%) without an active psychiatrist or addiction medicine specialist in 2020.
  • Track variation in Medicaid acceptance (as well as Medicare, private insurance, and uninsured) across prescriber types at the state and county level which is important given that nearly one out of four (23%) behavioral health prescribers did not treat Medicaid beneficiaries in 2020.
  • See how many DATA-waivered prescribers are actually prescribing buprenorphine for opioid addiction in your state or county. This is important as only 38% (34,120) of the 88,070 providers with a DATA-waiver in 2020 wrote at least one buprenorphine prescription for medication assisted treatment that year. Note: Does not include the 533 providers for whom we could not match with a National Provider Identifier to allow linking with prescription data. 
  • Identify the extent of the workforce treating serious mental illness (including primary care providers, nurse practitioners and physician assistants), at the state and county level.  

Resources

Please keep in mind that assessing the adequacy of supply relative to need is an ongoing challenge. The data presented in the Behavioral Health Workforce Tracker is not meant to provide absolute indications of whether the supply of the behavioral health workforce is adequate to meet need for behavioral health treatment. There is no established relationship between levels of behavioral health need indicators and need for treatment, nor any standards of the appropriate number or type of behavioral health practitioners per population size. In any particular location, need and supply may also depend on factors not accounted for in this tool. Users may adjust indicators and interpret the data at their own discretion.

​Request the data to use in your own analysis of this workforce. If you would like access to the database, please submit a request.
The Behavioral Health Workforce Tracker was created in partnership with HealthLandscape and was funded under grant number FG000028 from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The views, policies, and opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect those of SAMHSA or HHS and should not be construed as such.
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