Impact of homelessness and unstable housing on adolescent health

The purpose of this study was to describe service utilization and associated costs of a statewide, Medicaid-insured population of homeless adolescents (HA). This was a secondary data analysis of statewide individual service-level data. The total costs for this sample (n=5259) was $84,077,009 over the study period. Mental health related services accounted for 40% of all costs. A small subpopulation (n=65) of the sample accounted for 28% of the total costs, all of which had mental health related services. In order to reduce costs and improve health outcomes, there is a need to expand mental health services for HA.