Federal Employees' experience as a guide to the cost of insuring psychiatric services in the various states.

The two largest plans in the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program-Blue Cross and Blue Shield and Aetna - have reported benefit payments and the number of people who have used psychiatric services on a state-by-state basis for two decades. The author translates this experience into per capita utilization rates in a constant dollar terms and compares the benefit costs of the two plants over a 4-year period (1976-1979). Within each state, utilization rates did not change much over the 4 years, and the rank ordering among states by rate of utilization was quite similar for both plants. The author believes that the consistency noted can be useful in estimating costs of psychiatric coverage at the state level.