AJMC® in the Press, October 30, 2026

The commentary “Contributor: Congress Can Bring Mental Health Care to the 21st Century,” published in The American Journal of Managed Care® (AJMC®) in September 2026, urged Congress to pass the Mental Health TALK SAFE Act. The authors, Jesse M. Ehrenfeld, MD, MPH, and Ahmed Al-Katib, MD, pointed to a severe psychiatrist shortage, with a median wait of 67 days for a new in-person appointment. They argued the bill would help by creating a permanent federal pathway for telehealth prescribing of controlled medications, letting psychiatrists treat patients across state lines without separate licenses, and adding guardrails against telehealth companies that overprescribe. Fierce Healthcare cited the piece in an October 2026 article on Talkiatry’s nationwide therapy expansion, using it as policy context for the multistate licensure problems Talkiatry’s chief medical officer described.

The article “What You Should Know About National Prescription Drug Take Back Day,” published in The American Journal of Managed Care® (AJMC®) in April 2026, explained the DEA’s 30th biannual Take Back Day for patients and clinicians. It covered why household medication stockpiles drive misuse, what can and can’t be dropped off, year-round disposal options, when flushing is appropriate, and how clinicians can prompt patients to clear out their medicine cabinets. Straight Arrow News cited the piece in an article on the DEA’s 31st Take Back Day, attributing to it a summary of DEA guidance on accepted items and the figure of more than 16,500 year-round disposal locations.

The video interview “Insurance Barriers Block 4 in 10 From Injectable HIV PrEP,” published by AJMC® in October 2026, featured Aditi Ramakrishnan, MD, MSc, of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, discussing her IDWeek 2026 poster. Using records from a large Ryan White–funded clinic in St. Louis, her team found that 4 in 10 of 170 patients prescribed long-acting injectable PrEP wanted it but couldn’t get it, mostly because of insurance barriers: 54.3% lacked a pharmacy benefit and 41.4% were denied prior authorization. Ramakrishnan also noted that Missouri Medicaid doesn’t cover the injections and called for broader insurance coverage and more flexible care models. Gayety built an article around the study, using the AJMC interview as its source for Ramakrishnan’s quotes and pairing it with a second AJMC summary of the poster for the statistics.