Medical Expense✓ Verified · outline & fact-checked · Sep 2026Difficulty 1/5
Under federal mental health parity law, group health plans must ensure that mental health and substance use disorder benefits are:
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Answer & full 3-part explanation (select an option above, or peek)
Why A is correct
The Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act (MHPAEA) requires group health plans to apply financial requirements — deductibles, copayments, coinsurance — and treatment limits to mental health and substance use disorder benefits that are no more restrictive than those applied to medical and surgical benefits. The goal is to eliminate discriminatory coverage that treated mental health as a secondary benefit. Parity requires comparable treatment, not any particular level of benefits.
Why the other options are wrong
- B) Parity laws require mental health and substance use benefits to be treated comparably, not excluded.
- C) Mental health benefits are part of the group plan's benefit package, not a separate employer-paid policy.
- D) A fixed six-session limit for all plans would violate parity because medical and surgical benefits carry no such universal cap.
Memory hook
Mental health benefits must match medical and surgical benefits in cost-sharing and limits.