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Everything here is free to read, and nothing here is a claim about your case. Built from California’s published records and modified by us — not official government data. How these numbers were made.

Condition class · subcategory · California

Obsess/Compulsive denials at external review

When a California health plan denied care for obsess/compulsive and the enrollee took it to Independent Medical Review, this is what independent physician reviewers decided.

81.1%

Overturned
30 of 37
Era
2021-2025
Jurisdiction
California DMHC IMR
Published class
Obsess/Compulsive
Median days to decision
42
All years
64.8% of 122
30 overturned7 upheld

What reviewers relied on

3 validated codes

California requires each published decision to carry “a detailed case summary that includes the specific standards, criteria, and medical and scientific evidence, if any, that led to the case decision” (Health & Safety Code § 1374.33(h)(1)(K)). These are the elements our extraction found in this class, split by how the decision came out.

What the reviewer relied onIn overturnsIn upholds
the FDA label or approval status17%n=30
a standardised level-of-care instrument77%n=30
a California statutory definition3%n=30

Read as description, not instruction. These are patterns in what reviewers wrote, not steps to follow, and no combination of them predicts an outcome. Only codes that cleared the validation gate appear — thirteen did not.

Authorities named in this class

computed
  • LOCUS family24
  • FDA6
  • American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry5
  • American Psychiatric Association1
  • American Society of Addiction Medicine1

A rate here is the outcome of decisions that named the authority, not the effect of naming it. Reviewers cite the standard they applied; the citation and the outcome share a cause.

By treatment

computed
  • Overturned — the reviewer did not sustain the denial
  • Upheld — the reviewer sustained the denial
  • Mental Health87.1%31
  • Diagnostic imaging & screening2
  • Neurosurgery2
  • Autism-related treatment1
  • Electro, thermal & radiofrequency1

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The specific treatments inside this class

below n=30, no rate is claimed
  • RTC18
  • Intensive Outpt Prog4
  • Partial Hospital4
  • TMS3
  • Deep Brain Stimulator2
  • Genetic/Genomic Test2
  • Other2
  • Behavioral Therapy1

By review type

computed
  • Medical Necessity81.8%33
  • Experimental/Investigational4

Medical-necessity review asks whether the care is needed. Experimental/investigational review asks whether it is likely to be more beneficial than standard therapy — a harder statutory test, and the rates show it.

Every figure on this page is conditional on a denial having reached external review. Fewer than 1% of denials are appealed internally at all, so this describes denials that were fought to the end — not denials in general — and it describes California only. Who this does not cover.

Free help, first: the California DMHC Help Center files your Independent Medical Review at no cost — 1-888-466-2219, dmhc.ca.gov.