This report documents the progress the State of Kansas has made in response to a settlement agreement. A main tenet of the agreement was to improve access to mental health services. The State made continued progress in expanding the availability of crisis mental health services, and demonstrated a substantial improvement in screening children/youth entering care for trauma and behavioral health needs, though it did not achieve the Settlement Agreement standard for access to mental health services.
Strategies used to address the issue:
- Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinics (CCBHCs)
- Kansas’s Children’s Behavioral Interventionist (CBI) approach –
intensive services for children and families struggling to manage behavioral and
emotional challenges – became a new Medicaid covered service, significantly
increasing the ability of families to benefit from this cost-effective, trauma-informed
alternative to foster care and to help prevent placement disruption. - Family Mobile Crisis Response Helpline
- Conducted a survey of foster parents to determine the level of awareness of the Helpline as a resource, and subsequently held informational training sessions in what they considered low call volume areas
