Even With an Increased Need of Mental Health Services for Children, There's Just Not Enough Providers

Tuesday, April 18th, 2023 -- 1:01 PM

(By Natalie Eilbert, Green Bay Press-Gazette) -Amy DeBroux described the 13 years of advocating for her daughter's mental health as being at sea: periods of crisis followed by calm.

According to Natalie Eilbert with the Green Bay Press-Gazette, from 2005 to 2018, DeBroux spent hours discussing her daughter's educational and mental health support needs. The scenes were familiar enough for DeBroux, thanks to her background in education.

Normally, she would've sat on the same side of the table as the specialists, advocating for her students. But the tables had quite literally turned. Before she adopted her two children, DeBroux worked in Kaukauna and Appleton school districts, as well as a Connecticut school, for 10 years.

Now, both her children needed behavioral health support, with one of her children specifically needing a tailored program following her autism diagnosis. The team of educators, teachers, occupational therapists, speech pathologists, school psychologists, came with a list of suggestions for her child's individualized education program, commonly referred to as an IEP.

She absorbed the information as it was given, but still, she felt overwhelmed at times. "Any parent who has a child with special needs goes through a grieving process. That vision you had for your child, what you thought your child would be, is now different," DeBroux said.

"When you actually go through that process, you're asking so many questions: What are we going to have to do to help navigate things for our child? And how do I support myself supporting that person?”

Those questions are woven into a grim dynamic for thousands of Wisconsin families. At a time when studies indicate a desperate need for more mental health care services among Wisconsin's children and adolescents, the number of providers is simply not where it needs to be. As a result, the burden falls on parents and other family members, or on teachers and other school staff, none of whom likely have the necessary time or tools.

"If you have a cold, you go to the doctor right away. If you have a mental health issue, you have to fill out a form that says you're not eating, that says you're not sleeping. You have to wait six weeks or longer to get an appointment. And then you may get an appointment with someone who really doesn't resonate with you," said Linda Hall, director of Wisconsin Office of Children's Mental Health.

The irony is that, due to a number of initiatives funded by federal pandemic relief funds, Wisconsin schools recently have increased the number of social workers, counselors and psychologists, according to the Wisconsin Office of Children's Mental Health.

The bad news? In all three categories, Wisconsin has remained far below the recommended ratios of students to mental health professionals. The American School Counselor Association, for example, recommends one school mental health counselor for every 250 students, a ratio that is generally accepted across the country.

The latest school-counselor-to-student ratio in Wisconsin, according to data from 2021-2022, was 378 to one. The result, for families like the DeBrouxes, is that half of Wisconsin parents had difficulty obtaining mental health services.

And, perhaps no surprise, almost the same percentage of children ages 3 to 17 with mental health conditions did not receive treatment.

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