The report examines California Health Interview Survey (CHIS) data from 2011 to 2013 to facilitate state, regional, and county tracking of key mental health indicators. Those indicators include the need for mental health services, service use, unmet need for services and mental health-related functioning. The indicators selected were relevant for tracking some of the negative outcomes that California’s Mental Health Services Act (Proposition 63) seeks to improve through investment in prevention and early intervention programs, including suicide attempts, unemployment and other types of impairment, and prolonged suffering due to mental illness.

Findings: Women have higher rates of serious psychological distress compared to men and, although they use services at a higher rate, they still have a greater unmet need for services than men; Black and Latino Californians had significantly higher rates of serious psychological distress compared to white Californians; younger people in the state had lower rates of serious psychological distress, but higher rates of unmet need for mental health or substance use services; people living in the northernmost areas of California had higher rates of serious psychological distress compared to those in five areas studied, while the Bay Area had the lowest rates.