Unlocking Potential: The strength of Our Stories as The Key to Child Welfare reform

Unlocking Potential: The strength of Our Stories as The Key to Child Welfare reform
Youth in out-of-home care (“youth in care”), including youth in foster care, are more likely to
experience behavioral health disorders and less likely to receive sufficient and appropriate behavioral
health services than other youth in the United States. The services that youth in care receive often fail
to address the role of trauma in the etiology of those disorders. These issues are of heightened concern
for adolescents who transition from care to independent living after reaching their state’s age of
majority (“aging out”), typically at age 18. Aging out often creates stressors that affect the behavioral
health of adolescents and inhibits their access to behavioral health services. Even when adolescents
who have aged out or will age out from out-of-home care (“transition-age adolescents”) have putative
access to behavioral health services, impediments such as a lack of transportation and awareness of
their eligibility for services can further inhibit their receipt of needed care. Congress should consider
enacting policy changes to: improve the availability of trauma-informed, evidence-based behavioral
health services to transition-age adolescents; implement programs that help transition-age adolescents
access those services; and ensure that transition-age adolescents are aware of how they can access
those services.
http://s3.amazonaws.com/ccai/2017_Foster_Youth_Internship_Program%C2%AE_Report.pdf