A class action lawsuit claims United Behavioral Health, a unit of United Healthcare Insurance Company, unlawfully denies mental health coverage to policyholders.

According to the class action lawsuit, United Behavioral Health violated California’s Mental Health Parity Act, which requires insurers to provide treatment for mental-health diagnosis according to “the same terms and conditions” applied to medical conditions. Specifically, the insurer is accused of denying and improperly limiting mental health coverage by conducting concurrent and prospective reviews of routine outpatient mental health treatments when no such reviews are conducted for routine outpatient treatments for other medical conditions.

The United Healthcare class action lawsuit further charges the company with violating the Unruh Act by discriminating against people with mental disabilities and psychiatric conditions, as well as violating California’s law prohibiting unfair competition, breaching the terms of its own insurance contract with policyholders, and breaching the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing.

"This is an important case because it addresses an issue that impacts a wide range of people who are covered by health insurance" said the lead attorney representing the Class in the lawsuit. "For too long, people who suffer from severe mental health issues have not received health insurance coverage on the same terms as conditions that are applied to other conditions."

The lead Plaintiff in the class action lawsuit is a University of California employee who claims her mental health coverage was improperly reduced from four weekly outpatient psychotherapy sessions to only one weekly session for one month.  

The lawsuit is seeking to represent a class consisting of hundreds, and possibly thousands, of University of California employees who were subjected to improper review and denial of treatment for severe mental health illnesses.