and substance abuse disorder benefits. This includes out-of-network benefits. If plans choose to offer both types of benefits, MHPAEA mandates that insurers define and make available specific criteria for medical necessity when it comes to mental health and substance abuse disorder benefits. In addition, MHPAEA also requires that insurers provide specific information and reasons in the event that reimbursement or payment for treatment is denied. Implementation challenges One main challenge to the implementation of MHPAEA is what is known as "carve-out" health benefits. This refers to mental health benefits that are purchased by employers separately from medical benefits. The "carve-out" vendor may be separate from any number of other vendors providing medical benefits. The law would require the "carve-out" vendor to ensure parity with medical benefits provided by a separate vendor or vendors. In addition, the legislation itself did not create a mechanism to regularly monitor or evaluate the enforcement or implementation of the act. The Federal Parity Law and the follow-up regulatory/sub-regulatory guidance is complex and sometimes ambiguous. Solutions are needed to help implement and enforce the Federal Parity Law and applicable state laws. This includes opportunities to help automate and document NQTL comparability analyses in writing and in operation to further validate that the plan is treating MH/SUD coverage requirements/payments in the same manner as medical/surgical care. Several tools exist that can help promote parity compliance including the U.S. DOL Self-Compliance Tool, the CMS Parity Compliance Toolkit for Medicaid/CHIP, the Six Step Parity Compliance Guide, and ClearHealth Quality Institute’s Online Parity Tool. References Further reading United States federal health legislation Mental health law in the United States Acts of the 110th United States Congress Acts of the 104th United States Congress Healthcare reform legislation in the United States