Lawmakers are asking for action to reduce wait times for kids in emergency rooms.
The House Committee on Health Care sent a list of requests to a host of state officials Tuesday — including Agency of Human Services Secretary Mike Smith, Vermont Association of Hospitals and Health Systems CEO Jeff Tieman, and Agency of Education Secretary Dan French — asking them for concrete timelines and standards to ensure that children get the mental health care they need.
Among the requests:
- Immediate input from parents and families on how to improve the system.
- Better data collection on the number of children and adults in the emergency rooms.
- A timeline for reducing the wait time to an average of no more than 24 hours.
- More mental health support and better environments for kids who end up in the hospital.
- Monthly reports to the legislature through the end of the year.
While the Department of Mental Health proposed its own response to the issue, “we really need the accountability,” said Rep. Anne Donahue, R-Northfield, who helped craft the letter.
The letter comes in response to an ongoing children’s mental health crisis in Vermont as waitlists have surged for counseling appointments and inpatient treatment alike. The backlog has left children waiting for days in emergency rooms. In March, the average wait time soared to more than 100 hours.
After lawmakers and advocates raised the alarm, the Department of Mental Health put forward a slate of measures to address the shortage of mental health options, including loosening Covid-19 restrictions at mental health facilities to open up more slots for kids and teens and allowing in-person counseling appointments.
Sarah Squirrell, commissioner of the Department of Mental Health, has said she would work to increase placements for kids who are ready to be discharged from the Brattleboro Retreat but don’t have anywhere else to go. The state would also focus its efforts on attracting and retaining mental health workers, among other measures, she said.
The legislative session is set to conclude next week, and lawmakers said they want to ensure that the work actually gets done. Squirrell also announced she will be stepping down July 1.
With changes on the horizon, “who’s watching the chicken house?” said Rep. Woodman Page, R-Newport, during a committee hearing Tuesday. “This is a real serious issue.”
Legislators need to “work within a timeframe so we can start solving this problem,” said Rep. Leslie Goldman, D-Bellows Falls. It is a complex problem, she said, and any solution would have to extend from the community agencies up through the hospital system.
Lawmakers agreed that state officials could do more to remedy the immediate situation by improving the experience of kids who end up in the hospital.
In the letter, they requested more supports in the emergency room — mental health care, toys, dimmer lights, telehealth, and the separation of adults and kids. Does asking for those changes “mean we sanction the current situation? No, no, no,” Donahue said.
But what the state presented was a long-term effort — “not an emergency crisis response,” she said. “That was a concern to us.”
According to Donahue, the letter was less a chastisement of the state’s work and more of a way to ensure that the state is actually making progress.
With the end of the session looming, “we’re out of time for a discussion,” she said. “We needed to put something in writing.”
