Infrastructure Change Is Not Enough: An Evaluation of SAMHSA's Mental Health Transformation State Incentive Grants.

Objective: The authors evaluated the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration's mental health transformation state incentive grant program, which provided more than $100 million to nine states to make infrastructure changes designed to improve services and outcomes.

Methods: The authors measured infrastructure changes, service changes, and consumer outcomes in the nine programs. Although the federal program had no logic model, the authors adopted a model that hypothesized positive, but small, correlations between the program elements.

Cost of fetal alcohol spectrum disorders.

Fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) is a common identifiable teratogenic cause of mental retardation, neurological deficit, mental disorders, and developmental disabilities. Accurate estimates of the cost of care for persons with FAS are essential for appropriate funding of health care, developmental disabilities services, special education, and other service systems, as well as prioritizing funding of public health prevention efforts. The cost of care for individuals with FAS can be conceptualized as the annual cost of care for one person or a population, or as the lifetime cost of care for an individual.