Health Services/Policy
The Impact of the Universal Child Care Benefit on Acute Mental Health Service Use Among Parents: A Controlled Interrupted Time Series Study Jasleen Arneja* Jasleen Arneja Arneja Arneja McGill University
The Universal Child Care Benefit (UCCB), implemented in Canada in July 2006, was a universal income transfer that gave all families with children <age 6 an annual $1,200. Prior research has found that the UCCB was linked to reductions in BMI and the prevalence of obesity among mothers of younger children and improved maternal mental health and life satisfaction. It also reduced food insecurity, with stronger impacts in lower income households and single parent families.
Resource constraints (e.g., poverty and food insecurity) lead parents make trade-offs between food and other basic necessities, leading to stress, anxiety, and depression. Additional income received through the UCCB may increase parents’ disposable income and reduce financial stress. We aim to examine the population level impact of the UCCB on acute mental health service use among parents.
We used a controlled interrupted time series design to compare parents of children aged 0-6 to parents of children aged 6-17 who were not eligible for UCCB. Data came from health administrative databases and tax files, and an open cohort of health system users in Canada was developed— individuals who visited the hospital or ED and filed taxes at least once between 2004–2008. Our study included 26 months of pre-policy data (04/2004-06/2006) and 42 months of post-policy data (07/2006-12/2009).
Parallel pre-policy trends were confirmed. Count regression models accounting for overdispersion and autocorrelation were used to calculate rate differences in monthly mental health-related hospital and ED visits, including those for anxiety, mood disorders, substance use, and intentional self-harm. Newey-West standard errors were used to calculate 95% confidence intervals. We examined effect measure modification through stratified analyses by parent sex, marital status, and low-income status.
This study adopts a health-in-all-policies approach to inform evidence-based income support policies targeting families with children.