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* WGLT aired a heartbreaking story last week of a mentally ill teenage girl who had trouble finding a local psychiatrist and eventually committed suicide. Her case was not isolated…

McLean County Center for Human Services (CHS) Executive Director Tom Barr said struggles to find a child psychiatrist is common throughout all of McLean County.

“That’s a real challenge in McLean County, particularly for youth, because there aren’t any child psychiatrists in McLean County practicing at this point in time,” Barr said.

CHS has one psychiatrist and two advanced practice nurses on staff who can prescribe medication to youth age 12 and older. But, that is only a small slice of their full caseload, which is mainly focused on adult care.

Barr said CHS prioritizes services to individuals with the greatest need and the fewest resources in McLean County. To qualify as a client, they have to be on Medicaid.

A lot of times, they refer those in need to alternate providers.

“Oftentimes it’s out of the community. And that’s one of the great challenges at this point in time is the proximity to where the youth live and trying to provide services that, particularly when looking at the population that we serve who may not have the financial resources to travel a great distance,” Barr said. “Oftentimes the youth may end up being unserved or being seen by a pediatrician, or another primary care physician.”

* More…

“Fewer and fewer physicians are specializing in psychiatry, much less child psychiatry. And this is a nationwide phenomenon. It’s not unique to McLean County, and it’s not unique to Illinois,” Barr said. “What is unique to Illinois is some of the significant cuts that agencies like mine have received, particularly for psychiatric services.”

In 2015, the state cut psychiatric funding for mental health centers. For CHS, that meant a $350,000 cut.

From 2016 to now, Barr said, the United Way also cut $100,000 in contributions to the CHS psychiatric program because of fundraising challenges.

* And today, a very bad situation just got much worse…

McLean County’s mental health agency — which serves people with the greatest needs and fewest resources — has suspended accepting new clients into its psychiatric program because of declining support from the state and United Way of McLean County.

“We are not going to be accepting new referrals into the psychiatric program, effective immediately, until further notice,” Tom Barr, executive director of the Center for Human Services (CHS), told The Pantagraph on Monday.

The psychiatric program, which serves people age 12 and older with severe and persistent mental illness, prescribes medicine to low-income clients and works with them to access the medicine because the vast majority don’t have insurance or are on Medicaid or their deductibles are so high that they can’t afford the medicine, Barr said.

posted by Rich Miller
Monday, Dec 3, 18 @ 3:53 pm

Comments

Makes me think every municipality should be hiring psychiatrists to serve their residents. Maybe county public health departments.

Reminds me of Justin Slaughter’s bill to require all police departments to hire a social worker. HB5781

Comment by Dan Johnson Monday, Dec 3, 18 @ 4:09 pm
Just the tip of the iceberg. People with mental illness and developmental disabilities have been treated like 3rd class citizens in this state for the past 30 years. It’s a tragedy. Neither party has been willing to deal with this.

Comment by NeverPoliticallyCorrect Monday, Dec 3, 18 @ 4:11 pm
somewhere between 7 and 4 years ago, there was a 60 Minutes report about how in England they are doing a massive recruitment and training of therapists because they believe there is a huge need. in fact, they are placing their bets on talk therapy as a big need, bigger than med therapy. people automatically believe that the need is for psychiatrists, which means medical school, and sadly this is the lowest loved specialty for med students. but other therapy is helpful, just to talk to a professional can help sort things out. perhaps the first step is for people to stop stigmatizing the need. everyone needs to talk to a friend, in this case, a professional friend.

Comment by Amalia Monday, Dec 3, 18 @ 4:22 pm
And the county just opened a new addition to the jail with a specially designed area for mentally ill inmates. The jail has hired a second therapist to work with the inmates. So, I guess you go to jail to get mental health services?

Comment by Nearly Normal Monday, Dec 3, 18 @ 4:27 pm
What about tele-health? Seems perfect for situations like this when a more rural county can’t afford a specialized psychiatrist. Of course, knowing Illinois, maybe Medicaid doesn’t pay for these consultations.

Comment by Reserved Monday, Dec 3, 18 @ 4:35 pm
This is a real problem that gets worse as you move away from the Chicago area. It has made us question our choice to live in central Illinois rather than the burbs where we are from. Our child has some mental health issues and even though we have good insurance we Had hard time finding a psychiatrist and have to weight months for an appointment.

Schools are struggling with student mental health issues. Even high performers like AE Stevenson high school. We work to find opportunities to train staff but it is very challenging

Comment by JS Mill Monday, Dec 3, 18 @ 4:46 pm
A 5000 Head Swine CAFO is attempting to locate next to a certified organic farm in Adams County.
The operator of the farm is battling cancer and CAFO. Now that’s a heartbreaker. It is an organic composting and grain farm which utilized water from its own lake. Manured fields surrounding this farm will drain directly in to this lake threatening the business, Health and livelihood of Sunset Organics Farm.

Comment by Karen Hudson Monday, Dec 3, 18 @ 4:47 pm
When you get to the point where an entire county has no psychiatrist, it’s time to re-think who has the right to sign prescriptions. As noted above, advanced practice nurses (including nurse-practitioners) already have that right; the state can fund specialized psychiatric training for more advanced practice nurses, and perhaps for clinical psychologists. Psychiatric social workers can also be supported in various ways ([advanced] training)to provide the “talk therapy” which is in many cases proving more efficacious than drug therapy alone.

This can be addressed by an administration that actually wants to address it, with the cooperation of the GA (to modify regulations re: Rx writing), and with an outlay for specialized training/financial incentives for practitioners.

Comment by dbk Monday, Dec 3, 18 @ 7:00 pm
Why is mental illness treated so differently than other medical illness? IL needs to do a better job of attracting child psychiatrists and provide better funding for the treatment of mental illness.

Comment by Mama Monday, Dec 3, 18 @ 7:12 pm