Routine Screening for Anxiety in Medical Care Won’t Improve America’s Mental Health

Screening for anxiety would burden a nearly broken healthcare system and deprive people with serious mental health problems of needed services.

“We can screen lots of people, but if that’s all that happens, it’s a waste of time,” -- Dr. Jeffery Staab, Chair of the Department of Psychiatry and Psychology at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.

A New York Times is among lots of media reporting that the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) is recommending for the first time that doctors screen all adult patients under 65 for anxiety.

Actually, the USPSTF’s recommendation is a variation of old themes and can be met with the same objections as before.

The panel has not established that the benefits of screening that they promise can be achieved within the existing health system. The effort would likely do harm at the level of the health care system, as well as the level of care received by the individual patient.  

Screening would divert resources and clog waitlists with new patients who only sought treatment because screening scores suggested that they would benefit from treatment. The effort even to determine whether patients wit…