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Psychologists report limitations on psychological assessment services and problems gaining authorizations and reimbursement for these services from third-party payers. Documentation and categorization of these problems and limitations is based on responses from well over 500 psychologists responding to a broad solicitation for feedback. This article explores the barriers to access for assessment services, including resistance to psychological assessment, difficulties in the preauthorization process, problems with reimbursement, the clinical decision-making process, and larger systems issues. The authors make recommendations for redress of these problems through work with the profession, other mental health professionals, managed care, and patients-consumers and through political action.

Psychologists in health care settings today find it increasingly difficult to obtain authorization and appropriate reimbursement for psychological assessments from 3rd party payers. Authorization and reimbursement denials often are based on allegations that empirical support for the utility and validity of psychological tests is nonexistent or limited. This article reviews a sample of the considerable empirical support that exists for the utility and validity of a variety of psychological tests for a wide range of clinical health care applications. Informed by data such as these, psychologists should become more effective in their abilities to seek authorization and reimbursement for assessment and overturning denials.

Practicing members of the American Psychological Association (APA) were surveyed regarding their work settings, activities, and greatest professional concerns in the managed care era. Results from 15,918 licensed psychologists indicated that half were full-time independent practitioners engaged principally in psychotherapy and assessment and another third were in part-time private practice. Four out of five reported a negative impact of managed care on their practices. Concerns about changes to practice and ethical dilemmas as a result of managed care policies were common to all settings. Relatively few differences were apparent between earlier and more recent generations.

The Education and Training Guidelines: A Taxonomy for Education and Training in Professional Psychology Health Service Specialties was endorsed as a policy of the American Psychological Association in 2012. These Guidelines have the potential for broad impact on the field by providing both a structure and recommendations for the consistent usage o f language— definitions and terminology—to reduce current descriptive inconsistencies across education and training programs in professional psychology. The Guidelines are not designed to define specifics of the training or practice of individual psychologists; they are to be used only to describe programmatic structure in a consistent manner. This article details the developmental history o f these Guidelines and highlights the strong alliance between the leaders of the various recognized specialties in professional psychology and the education and training community in health service psychology. The content, application, future dissemination and impact o f the Guidelines are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]