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Human Services and Elder Affairs Committee
Massachusetts Congressional Delegation
House Bill 4277 (concerning Mental Health Needs of Children)
What can I do to support House Bill 4277?
The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill of Western Massachusetss (NAMI-WM) wants to go on record as an emphatic supporter of House Bill 4277, “An Act to Ensure Accountability and Provide for the Mental Health Needs of Children.”
NAMI-WM’s Board of Directors has set as its top priority, our advocacy for improvement and accountability in the State’s delivery of mental health services to children and adolescents. NAMI-WM’s Office receives over 100 first-time calls per month from families and professionals seeking our assistance in obtaining needed mental health services for persons with serious mental illnesses. Increasingly over the last several years, more and more of these calls have been on behalf of mentally ill children. Reports from our national NAMI Office tell us that this is a national trend. Here in Massachusetts children are “stuck” in hospital beds because necessary residential or day treatment programs will not be available for them if they are discharged. Some of these children might never have been in hospital beds if appropriate programs had been available for them to prevent hospitalization. Some children wait for Special Education programs which are being delayed or denied by school districts and their illnesses worsen. Sadly, at this time in medical history when more families are aware of mental illnesses and possible treatments than ever before, parents find themselves caught not only in the anquish of their child’s illness but are utterly confused by the jumble of departments and agencies they encounter on their long jouney of seeking treatment for their child.
NAMI-WM has become acutely aware that a real crisis exists for children within the several mental health service-delivery systems. Because our Board has focused on children and adolescents, NAMI-WM has gathered as much data and information as possible in Western Massachusetts. We have made inquiries about services from the several public systems (DMH, DSS, DOE/SPED, DMR, DYS) and from the many contracted providers (such as MBHP, other insurance providers, hospitals, provider agencies and programs). All serve children but all recognize the shortage of services and the complexity of the overall problems.
What NAMI-WM has found is that the delivery of children’s mental health services is not a straight road nor a problem with a simple solution. The crisis resembles a complicated maze of tangled paths riddled with potholes.
Prior to the introduction of House Bill 1206, NAMI-WM had already come to the firm conclusion that before Massachusetts can prudently provide adequate and appropriate services to its mentally ill children in a timely manner, there must be an official sorting out of what is already actually happening or not happening, where the points of weakness and blockages occur, and then an assessment made of the true dimensions of the problem. Only then will legislators understand where and how to invest money and re-arrange delivery systems to improve mental health services for our children.
NAMI-WM urges every legislator to vote for passage of House Bill 4277 now and then to press for immediate implementation of it provisions. Our children need help today.
Submitted by,
Jane E. Moser, President, National Alliance for the Mentally Ill of Western Massachusetts
September 21, 2001