Connecticut recently created four urgent crisis centers throughout the state, which are meant to help children facing mental health crises get the help they need as quickly as possible. The urgent crisis centers are in Hartford, New Haven, Waterbury, and New London. 

The roles of the urgent crisis centers are to deescalate the situation and connect the child to other services within 24 hours. Children who are in dire need of help and may harm themselves, are directed to the nearest hospital, even though the centers were created to limit emergency room visits.

These urgent crisis centers are instrumental since struggling with mental health issues as a minor and having to wait in an emergency room for hours before getting help can be deadly. Having access to immediate, quality care when facing a crisis can be lifesaving. A lack of mental health services for youth can lead to worsening mental health crises, including suicide. Connecticut has taken a step to address this problem, but more still needs to be done.

One of the main issues that still needs to be addressed is that around the clock help is not yet available. Some children need crisis help after the allotted open hours, which end at 11pm. After 11pm, minors in need of mental health help will still have to go to the emergency room, which defeats the purpose of creating the centers.

Research conducted by Michael Perlis, director of the Behavioral Sleep Medicine Program at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia has shown that people are more likely to die by suicide after midnight and before six am. The peak rate of suicides occur between two and three am. The four urgent crisis centers have varying hours, but none of them are open before six am or later than 11 pm. That means during the peak hours of suicide attempts, the urgent crisis centers are not open and cannot help prevent children from ending their lives.

It should be noted that although the centers are designed to help children in a crisis, there are 72 spots a day for patients to be seen and no overnight beds available. Children are not able to stay the night in these urgent crisis centers, even if it may take hours to deescalate the situation.

These improvements would require funding to keep these centers up and running. They are currently using money given to them by the state, but that money, which came through the American Rescue Plan Act, is limited. Setting up the urgent crisis centers without sustainable funding is setting the centers up to fail. Recurring funds should be given to the urgent crisis centers annually, provided by the state of Connecticut. The funding should come through Medicaid, as the majority of the urgent crisis centers are behavioral health outpatient clinics. Medicaid is the largest mental health funder throughout the US, therefore the costs of the centers should be covered by this program. Without a consistent funding method, the centers will run out of money and have to close.

It is imperative for the mental health of children that the urgent crisis centers stay open, as they have provided a lot of support within the short time they have been operating. If the urgent crisis centers close when they run out of money, the efforts made to help minors struggling with mental health will be for nothing. Children will have to go back to waiting hours to be seen when they are facing a mental health crisis.

Having stable funding will ensure the safety of children suffering from mental health issues and could potentially lead to the centers being open 24 hours a day. The urgent crisis centers have had tremendous success helping minors, and there needs to be action in confirming the operations of the centers.

Leah Demko is a Junior at Sacred Heart University, majoring in Health Science with a Psychology minor.