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A closer look at USU ‘mental health crisis’

The Herald Journal - 2/19/2017

A few years ago, when Utah State University student Ty Aller began his clinical training at USU, he came across numerous students with mental health issues.

“I recognized it really hurts not only their schooling but their potential for success after they graduated,” Aller, a Ph.D. student and a licensed associate therapist, told Utah lawmakers during a hearing at the Capitol on Feb. 9.

Aller said hearing his interactions with students facing mental health instability prompted him and his colleagues to start a movement to address student mental health issues. That effort started last year, when the USU Student Association declared a “mental health crisis” on campus.

Now, Aller and Rep. Ed Redd, R-Logan, a Cache Valley physician, are trying to push through the Legislature a resolution declaring mental health issues to be “a public health crisis” at Utah higher education institutions.” The resolution passed the House this week and is going to the Senate.

“Students oftentimes start becoming depressed, their deterioration in academic performance can add to the problem, and sometimes they get to the point where they might want to take their own life,” Redd said in an interview. “It’s sad. Mental illness is treatable; it’s not something people have to live with.”

The resolution calls on state and local entities and higher education institutions to work together to “identify deficiencies” in mental health treatment and allow for communities to share mental health resources with schools.

The resolution also calls on everyone involved to provide a report detailing “specific findings of collaborative successes and ongoing mental health services deficiencies” and make recommendations for possible solutions to a legislative committee by the fall of 2017.

In an interview, Redd talked about why he took made is campaign on campus mental health issues into a resolution rather than a bill.

“Before you do a bill, you have to have better idea of what the problems are and what the exact solutions might be,” he said. “The goal is for the students to study this, evaluate the situation, work with community partners and then come back to the Legislature with suggestions of how to improve the situation and reduce the amount of suffering from mental illness.”

Redd’s resolution also comes at the same time the Board of Regents announced that its Mental Health Taskforce met for the first time last week. The taskforce was created in response to mental health crises being declared on campuses and is working to respond to those institutions’ needs.

“Mental health crisis” at USU

Jim Davis, director of USU Health and Wellness Center, recognizes mental health issues afflict many USU students.He said depression is the most diagnosed illness on campus, and anxiety comes in a close second.“From attendance at national meetings of college healthcare providers and reading current research, it is clear that this situation is not unique to Utah State University, nor to Utah,” Davis wrote in an email interview. “It is a nationwide epidemic that affects college students all across the country.”

And, Davis said, like many other campuses in Utah and across the country, USU has seen its share of students taking their own lives.

“Many of our students have experienced this firsthand or have roommates, friends or classmates who are experiencing it,” he wrote.

Utah ranked third in the nation for youth suicide rates (ages 10-17) in 2015 — the most recent data available — and fifth highest in the U.S. for overall suicide rates, according to Andrea Hood, the Utah Health Department’s suicide prevention coordinator.

Although Utah’s youth suicide rate for 2016 was not yet available, Hood said the Utah Health Department’s preliminary numbers suggest it may be down from 2015.

In addition to the youth suicide rate, Redd’s resolution has two other statements that bolster his and others’ belief that Utah’s higher education institutions are facing a mental health crisis:

• Students with mental health issues at USU and other institutions may have to wait as as long as four to six weeks to get help from certified counselors at the school.

• USU and several other schools do not meet the national recommendation of one full-time counselor per 1,000-1,500 students.

Dave Bush, director of USU’s Counseling and Psychological Services, or CAPS, confirmed that both of those statements are true for USU.

“Over the last decade, the (student) demand for service has doubled, and because of that, our ability to respond has fallen short,” Bush said.

Bush says student demanding help for mental health has increased in part because of the growth in the overall student population, but also because more students are willing to get help than they were 10 years ago.

“The stigma has been reduced,” Bush said.

LuAnn Helms, assistant director of CAPS, wrote in an email that assuming a student population of 17,000 students in Cache Valley, CAPS should have between 11 and 17 full-time therapists. That would meet the national recommendation of one full-time counselor per 1,000-1,500 students set by the International Association of Counseling Services, or IACS, which accredits CAPS.

But CAPS currently has 7.25 (6 full-time, one 75 percent time, and one 50 percent time), Helms said.

Bush noted that USU’s shortfall of counselors is a topic that IACS brings up annually.

“It’s a concern when they come for accreditation visits,” he said “We are accredited. Worst-case scenario put us on probation, but that hasn’t happened because they recognize we’re doing our best and making efforts to try to improve.”

Bush said his office hopes for some fee increases as well as a recommendation of a Tier II tuition increase by USU President Noelle Cockett.

Finding solutions

An easy fix for USU to accommodate all students with mental health issues would be to hire more counselors, but a variety of factors, including funding, have prevented that from happening, Bush said.These days, CAPS is encouraging more students on a waiting list to try different things to get help — like group therapy and workshops. Self-help, through the use of smartphone applications and other electronic media, are also being used by students.“I’d much rather have a student attend a workshop or use an app than sit and wait for three to four weeks,” Bush said. “That seems a much better use of their time.”

Bush said as CAPS’s waiting list gets bigger, his office refers about 20 percent of its clients to the Marriage and Family Therapy Clinic on campus or the Community Clinic in the USU psychology department.

Davis said the Health and Wellness Center has responded to “the escalating situation” of having more students seeking help with mental issues by increasing staff. This includes adding a psychiatrist because of the “increasingly complex medication strategies that are being employed to counter the current mental health trends,” as well as adding three therapists.

“We advise, counsel and medicate the stressed, depressed and suicidal as they present to us on a daily basis,” Davis wrote. “Sometimes, in the extreme cases, we recommend hospitalization or withdrawal from school.”

Redd’s resolution also calls for university and community mental health services providers to form local coalitions and work collaboratively to share available resources, including crisis prevention and interventions.

“Sometimes, mental health treatment operates in a silo,” Redd said.

But USU officials and community mental health services say they’re already working together to make sure students can get treatment for mental health.

“I think there’s very good communication,” Bush said.

Jill Parker, a spokeswoman for the Bear River Health Department, said BRHD and USU partner to provide prevention, intervention and crisis mental health resources.

“Our health educators and treatment director have met with members of USU student body and faculty and are working with them to coordinate mental health services and provide assistance when they have reached capacity,” Parker wrote in an email to the newspaper.

That partnership is the result of a 2014 needs assessment, which also spurred a local suicide prevention coalition, she said.

Bush has a message for some USU students struggling to deal with mental health issues. “There’s always hope,” he said. “Our focus is on (helping them) find a reason to live. If we can shift the emphasis to ‘hope,’ I think we’ll make a significant difference.”

USU student Ty Aller is trying to push through the Legislature a resolution declaring a mental health ‘crisis’ at Utah’s higher education institutions.

Eli Lucero/Herald Journal

USU student Ty Aller is trying to push through the Legislature a resolution declaring a mental health ‘crisis’ at Utah’s higher education institutions.

Eli Lucero/Herald Journal