Testimony: Public Roundtable on Inpatient Psychiatric Facilities and the Continuum of Behavioral Health Care

Children’s Law Center Director of Social Work Kim Daulton testified at the DC Council Committee on Health’s Public Roundtable on the Oversight, Capacity, and Quality of In-Patient Psychiatric Facilities and the Continuum of Behavioral Health Care in the District of Columbia. In her testimony, she discusses how gaps in the behavioral health system can lead to escalation of behavioral health issues, repeated crises, acute inpatient psychiatric hospitalizations, and in some cases arrest and involvement in the delinquency system for youth in the District. These gaps include insufficient access to community-based behavioral health services, inadequate crisis response systems, poor discharge planning and post-discharge services, and lack of both intermediate and long-term intensive treatment programs in DC.