Care Management

Health and human service programs have been consistently criticized for poor quality (Applebaum, Straker, & Geron, 2000). Inadequate information for consumers, confusing eligibility rules, an uncoordinated array of providers, and limited monitoring of services are universal concerns across settings. In response, the concept of case management has emerged as a popular strategy to help individuals navigate the fragmented health and human services system. Such diverse service areas as corrections, unemployment, child welfare,
mental health, substance abuse and acute health care have all employed case management as a technique to fix a troubled system (Ackerly & Grabowski, 2014; Barman-Adhikari & Rice, 2014; Chinman et al., 2015; Dauber, Neighbors, Dasaro, Riordan, & Morgenstern, 2012; McDonald & Arlinghaus, 2014;; Rapp,
Noortgate, Broekaert, & Vanderplasschen, 2014). In this entry we describe the practice of case management and examine the question of whether reliance on case managers is the best approach to fixing service system challenges.