When the new $224 million mental health hospital and outpatient center for children opens next year on the campus of Children’s Hospital of The King’s Daughters, the region will be taking a major step forward in the availability of critical resources in the treatment of mental health conditions among the region’s children and adolescents.
The need for such resources has been well documented. One in three visits to primary care pediatricians is related to mental health concerns, which is also the most common cause that youth ages 10-17 are admitted to the hospital in our region. In fact, as many as 10 children per day come to CHKD’s emergency room for a mental health evaluation. Tragically, suicide is the second leading cause of death for youths ages 10-24, with 18% of high school students reporting they have considered taking their lives within the past year.
Overall, one in five American children have a diagnosable mental health condition.
Unfortunately, Virginia lags behind much of the country in the mental health resources. According to the State of Mental Health in America, 2020, the commonwealth ranks 41st in the nation in the size of our mental health workforce. In Virginia, for every 100,000 children younger than 18, there are only 13 child and adolescent psychiatrists.
Research from the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry tells us that the situation in Hampton Roads has been just as alarming. For the 275,000 children in the region, there were just 22 child psychiatrists (2012-2016). With the impact of the COVID pandemic and exacerbation of racial disparities in the last year, the unmet needs will continue to grow.
The good news, however, is that those numbers are already climbing as the new mental health facility at CHKD has begun to augment our clinical staff even well before opening. By this summer, CHKD’s in house mental health team will include 10 child psychiatrists as well as five nurse practitioners, six psychologists, and nearly 30 therapists and medical social workers. We also plan to expand our workforce by training new child psychiatrists and other clinicians.
Even so, CHKD’s growing clinical team and a major new facility will not be sufficient alone for addressing the scope of the region’s challenges in mental health preventive care and ongoing clinical treatment. That is why we are so excited about the formal launch of a new statewide network designed to help thousands of young people across the commonwealth access the mental health resources they may need.
Called VMAP — the Virginia Mental Health Access Program — the program will connect Virginia’s pediatricians and other primary care providers caring for children and adolescents with trained mental health professionals who can help them meet their patient’s mental health needs in the primary care settings and connect them with additional services.
More than three years in the making, this statewide network can enhance delivery of mental health services to children and teenagers who may be exhibiting symptoms of anxiety, depression, ADHD and other behavioral concerns. Here in Hampton Roads, VMAP services will be delivered by CHKD mental health providers, serving as the heartbeat of VMAP in the region.
At the foundation, VMAP is a training program designed to help primary care providers more effectively screen, diagnose, manage and treat an array of pediatric mental health conditions. Child and adolescent psychiatrists and licensed mental health providers also are available for consults over the phone and care navigators are available to help patient families identify mental health services in Hampton Roads as well as other areas of the state.
VMAP holds the promise of extending the resources that will be available through CHKD’s new facility and providing collaborative opportunities for the region’s pediatricians and other primary care providers. The result will be an unparalleled system of integrated care for our region’s young people.
Dr. Mary Margaret Gleason is a triple-board physician in pediatrics, general psychiatry and child and adolescent psychiatry and vice chief of mental health at Children’s Hospital at the King’s Daughters in Norfolk. She is a consulting child psychiatrist for VMAP. Stephanie Osler is a licensed clinical social worker and the director of the mental health program at Children’s Hospital of The Kings Daughters. She has been at CHKD for more than 17 years and worked closely with the VMAP team during its development.
