Mental Health Care on College Campuses is Soaring

01 The article “A dangerous wait: Colleges can’t meet soaring student needs for mental health care” was published on Stat News by Megan Thielking on February 5, 2017.

02 A recent stat survey unveiled a striking realization – students are waiting weeks to receive mental health services.

03 According to reports from various universities and private colleges nationally, colleges are under staffed and can have a single counselor for every 3,500 students at some schools.

Colleges across the country are seeing a demand for mental health care. STAT surveyed dozens of universities, ranging from major public institutions to small, elite colleges, and found that students often wait weeks for an initial intake exam to review their symptoms and longer to see a psychiatrist who can prescribe prescriptions.

Though a few weeks might not seem like much, for college students dealing with being away from home, not having a support network, or struggling with academic and peer pressure, these wait times can be damaging.

A student at Indiana University, Constance Rodenbarger, was desperate to see someone while dealing with long-term depression and an abusive relationship. With the next appointment being two weeks away Rodenbarger wasn’t sure if she could make it. “If I can just make it one more day, but then it became just one more hour, and then one more minute,” said Rodenbarger. The day before her appointment, Rodenbarger tried to kill herself. Indiana now connects students within two days, but appointments can be scheduled up to three weeks away. Nancy Stockton, the director of Indiana University’s counseling office, said they are working on expanding their staff.

After both her grandparents and high school friend had passed, Adrienne Baer, a student at the University of Maryland, reached out to the counseling center, but when she said that she was unsure if she was experiencing an emergency, she got pushed to the end of the waiting list. “I had to wait. There was nothing I could do,” said Baer. Baer said she was lucky to get through a stressful semester by leaning on friends and family, but not all students are that lucky.

The demand for counseling on college campuses has been rising for years. The rise could be due to pressure from parents, social media, difficulty in classes or finding a job and the increased awareness surrounding mental health conditions. “Requests for appointments shot up 16 percent last year alone,” said Sharon Kirkland-Gordon, director of the University of Maryland’s counseling center.

Colleges around the country are trying to accommodate the needs of students seeking mental health care. In 2015, large campuses reported an average of one licensed mental health provider per 3,500 students. As wait lists grew at the University of California, it updated counseling services in 2014. “A lot can happen in four or five weeks during a quarter in college. It really wasn’t ok to have that delay in place,” said Gary Dunn, director of counseling and psychological services for the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Frustrated students launched a Change.org petition last year in hopes to improve mental health care on campuses and expose a growing national epidemic. While there’s not yet an answer for the rise in demand for mental health services from students, one thing is certain – our schools are not equipped or funded to meet the current demands.

To read the article in full, head here.