Mental CurrentsResearch publication
MENTAL CURRENTS

Data and analysis on mental health, work and everyday life

Lead analysis · Treatment

The mental-health crisis is also a care-delivery crisis.

Public conversation tends to ask whether mental illness is rising. The more immediate finding is that millions of people who already meet the criteria still receive no care.

50.9%
of U.S. adults with any mental illness received treatment in 2025

That leaves 49.1% without treatment during the year. Among adults with a major depressive episode, roughly one-third received no treatment.

Analysis of SAMHSA NSDUH · National adult estimates · Definitions vary by measure

Science desk

Scientific attention expanded across the workplace-relevant conditions we tracked.

Annual PubMed output rose sharply from 2016 to 2025. More papers do not automatically mean better evidence, but the direction is unmistakable.

PubMed Title/Abstract queries · Publication counts may update as records are indexed
Research pipeline

A large trial registry is not the same as a mature evidence base.

9–19%of matched studies had posted results across six condition searches

ClinicalTrials.gov contains thousands of studies, but registry size mixes observational work, interventional trials, completed studies and old records. “With results” is a transparency signal, not a quality score.

Measurement gap

Are we measuring mental health fast enough to understand how it is changing?

For several major conditions, the most recognizable federal prevalence statistic is older than the iPhone. That is not evidence that prevalence stayed flat. It is evidence that our national picture has a blind spot.

OCD2001–03
PTSD2001–03
Eating disorders2001–03
ADHD, children2024
Underlying data vintage, not webpage update date
Latest briefs

Four signals. Four different stories.

Treatment49.1%

Nearly half of adults with mental illness received no treatment

The national treatment gap remains the clearest system-level finding in the newest SAMHSA data.

Measurement23 years

Some of the statistics we treat as current are anything but

Widely cited national estimates for OCD, PTSD and eating disorders still rely on interviews from 2001–2003.

Work and access32.8%

Telehealth has become part of the mental-health treatment system

Among adults with mental illness, nearly one-third received mental-health treatment through telehealth in 2025, changing how care can fit around work and daily life.

Public attention+166%

ADHD search interest rose much faster than the available prevalence benchmarks

Useful as a cultural signal. Not a diagnosis count, and no longer the whole publication.

Explore attention data →
A methodological line in the sand

A prescription claim does not reveal the diagnosis behind it.

CMS Part D can show which drugs were dispensed and who prescribed them. It generally cannot show which condition motivated the prescription. Drugs with multiple indications make tidy condition-level charts scientifically shaky.

Mental Currents will use MEPS condition linkage where defensible and label broad measures as broad. Precision cosplay is still cosplay.

Methods and sources →
StoriesRead the analysis →Mental healthBrowse the research program →DataInspect sources and limits →
A reader’s guide

Three rules for reading the evidence.

Separate attention from prevalence. A topic can become more visible without becoming more common.

Check the population and year. National estimates often describe different ages, definitions, and periods.

Treat disagreement as information. When signals diverge, the gap is a question to investigate, not a conclusion to disguise.