Bipartisan Policy Center Event Shines Light On Rural America’s Youth Mental Health Crisis

© The Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust

The Bipartisan Policy Center (BPC) hosted an event in South Dakota last month to shine a light on the nation’s youth mental health and substance use crisis and discuss innovative policy solutions to combat rising depression and suicide rates across rural America.

In January, the BPC launched a Youth Mental Health and Substance Use Task Force to develop evidence-based, pragmatic policy solutions to address the youth mental health and substance use crisis. The Helmsley Charitable Trust provides grant support for the task force, which held the “Resilience in Remote Places: Crisis Response for Rural Youth” discussion April 26 at Avera Health’s Helmsley Behavioral Health Center.

“The youth mental health and substance use rates have been soaring,” says Marilyn Serafini, Executive Director for the BPC’s Health Program. “This didn’t start with the pandemic, but the pandemic sure did make it worse.”

Walter Panzirer, a Trustee for the Helmsley Charitable Trust, spoke on a panel featuring Dr. David Ermer, Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist with Avera Behavioral Health; Karen Rosengreen, Vice President of Medical Services of Season’s Center for Behavioral Health; and Matt Althoff, Secretary of the South Dakota Department of Social Services.

Panzirer cited the success of South Dakota’s Virtual Crisis Care pilot program, which provides law enforcement officers with 24/7 access to behavioral health professionals through the use of tablets, allowing them to call on trained experts to de-escalate such mental health crises as suicidal ideation, self-harm and depression.

“You have trained people making the decision. Not a police officer, but a trained therapist,” Panzirer says.

The South Dakota program has been a huge success, with statewide figures showing that more than 75 percent of VCC encounters result in the person in crisis staying in place — thus avoiding costly transfers to far-away mental health facilities. The South Dakota program’s success led to a similar initiative in Nevada.

An earlier fireside chat at the BPC event featured a discussion with former U.S. Rep. Val Demings and Sioux Falls Mayor Paul TenHaken. Former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, co-founder of the BPC, offered opening remarks via a remote broadcast. The panels were moderated by Sarah Jane Tribble, Chief Rural Health Correspondent for KFF Health News.