Emails and phone calls can be relentless at times. Young families seeking help from our community clinic on the University of Denver campus often wait more than a month for specialized therapeutic services tailored to children and their parents. In the midst of the COVID pandemic, appointment requests almost doubled and demand has remained high ever since. This is a testament to the growing mental health crisis sweeping across our nation.
As Americans of all ages experience mental health problems at alarming rates, our team of psychologists and clinical students are especially concerned about the well-being of children. Currently, children and their families make up half of our patients.
Data shows that 50% of all mental illness begins before the age of 14, and parents often share the anguish and frustration of trying to find support for a child in crisis, as these services are often in high demand and expensive when paying out of pocket. These calls for help are indicative of a systemic failure to address the needs of the most vulnerable.
Here in our home state of Colorado, mental health has become a growing priority for lawmakers, with dozens of bills pending this session and several new pieces of legislation already making a difference. We encourage other lawmakers across the country to follow suit and call for new legislation that would help financially support – and therefore incentivize – emerging professionals hoping to enter this field.
An example of recent legislation already making a difference in our state is a law requiring Medicaid to cover mental health services for qualifying youth (up to age 21) without a formal mental health diagnosis. More than 4 in 10 children nationally are covered by Medicaid, and 25 states have taken the initial step of investing in their Medicaid school program to take advantage of federal funding. Colorado’s law goes a step further by eliminating the need for a diagnosis and therefore removing a potential barrier to support and treatment.
During the pandemic, CDC findings showed that 44 percent of American children had depressive episodes lasting at least two weeks, and nearly half of them had suicidal thoughts. Diagnosing mental illness and finding successful interventions in childhood and adolescence is paramount, so removing barriers for those seeking services, as these laws aim to do, is a game changer.
Another recently passed law in Colorado provides funding to support school mental health professionals in the K-12 system. Statewide in the 2022-23 school year, there was an average of 1 psychologist for every 1,119 students in kindergarten through 12th grade, and nearly 40 percent of school districts had no school psychologists at all. Funding grants that facilitate the hiring of additional mental health professionals, fostering connections between schools and community providers, and offering vital professional development for current counselors are steps in the right direction.
To make care more affordable, Colorado lawmakers also created I Matter in the fall of 2021. Children and teens up to age 18 — and under 21 if receiving special education services — can sign up online for access to six free telehealth or in-person counseling sessions. More than 11,000 children have joined the program in the last two and a half years. Lawmakers are currently considering a bill to make the program permanent before the legislative session ends in May.
While we are encouraged by these initiatives and hope that other states will follow suit, we also recommend additional legislative action. The Biden administration has increased funding for schools to hire additional support, but we need to further strengthen the pathways to not only hire, but to fully train these professionals. State or federal legislators should increase funding for scholarships and further support loan forgiveness programs for individuals entering the mental health field.
We believe these incentives will help ease the financial burden and remove barriers for aspiring professionals, while ensuring an influx of diverse talent in this critically under-resourced field. At DU, we have revised our curriculum to better cultivate a workforce dedicated to serving children. We now offer nearly a dozen courses designed to provide graduates with the training they need to work with children of all ages.
Let’s build on the legislative progress made in Colorado and further advocate for additional support. The future of our children and our society depends on collective action and commitment to support mental health care for all.
Jeremy Hefner is the 19th chancellor of the University of Denver.
Tori Wilson is Dean of the Graduate School of Professional Psychology at the University of Denver.
