Representative payeeship and mental illness: a review

Representative Payeeship (RP) is intended to help individuals who are unable to manage disability payments appropriately to meet their basic living needs. This paper reviews the literature on whether RP is effective among individuals with mental disorders. We also review RP's mental health effects and its use as leverage in achieving behavioral goals. RP appears to be effective in helping clients meet their basic living needs; it also may decrease hospitalization and improve treatment compliance. Finally, we propose a research design to disentangle the role of clinical leverage from the more basic money-management function of RP.