Research Paper 2: Access to Mental Health for the Youth

Access to Mental Health for the Youth
Student Name
Institution Affiliation
Date of Submission
Background
Mental health care is a subject that has been largely associated with the adults. However, there is a population that has been neglected for the longest time and one that not most researches have addressed; this is the population of youths that are suffering from mental health conditions. In most of the cases, the youths and their families do not have access to mental health care in their neighborhood and in some of the cases in their counties (Geist, 2017). As most of the health care facilities have concentrated their efforts on the adults’ population suffering from mental health conditions. In the wake of the school shootings that have been on the rise, there is a need to address the question of access to mental health services for the youths and children in the United States. It is clear that most of the policies in place within the health care systems do not capture the element of mental health among the youths. The hospital does not offer adequate cover for the mental conditions suffered by youths and hence the need for the changes (Cummings, Wen & Druss, 2013). This is also reflected at the national policies, however, this project will concentrate on the hospital policies which are much easier to review and change. In the future, the program could be expanded to cover the entire of the United States or some parts of the states. Parents struggling with mentally unstable children find themselves with the burden of accessing health care services out of their pockets (Geist, 2017).
Time
The project is estimated to take quite some time relative to the number of stakeholders that are involved in the changes. Given the parties involved and the intricate processes of getting the policies changed and implemented, it is estimated that the project will take one and half years. Relative to the scale of the internal policies that the hospital has to change one and a half years is going to be enough (Georgetown Institute, 2017).
Goals
* To offer parents a comprehensive cover for their youths
* To offer youth suffering from mental health access to medical insurance
* To offer adequate mental health care to the youths at the hospital depending on their resources
* To reduce the impact of mental health conditions on the society
Scope
The scope of the project is going to include a number of phases, one of them being the evaluation of the current policies on youth mental care services. This will include the level of access to health care services, which include checkups, treatment plans, and medication, dedicated teams to develop winning treatment plans and follow up services. The other aspects will involve the establishment of the insurance cover packages that will be introduced in the pilot project to cover the different social classes. The packages will heavily borrow from the Affordable Care Act approaches in developing policies.
Cost
The project is estimated to cost roughly 20 million dollars. This is considering that there quite a number of aspects that are involved in the project, such as the campaign, education, stakeholder meeting facilitation, evaluation of the current polici...