On April 1, 2015, First Focus Campaign for Children sent this sign-on letter to House and Senate leadership in support of the Administration’s proposal for a five-year collaborative demonstration involving the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). It is designed to encourage states and tribes to provide evidence-based psychosocial interventions to children and youth in foster care and to reduce the inappropriate use and over-prescription of psychotropic medications.
First Focus Campaign for Children and Voice for Adoption coordinated this effort and 128 national, state, and local organizations signed on in support of the proposed demonstration. The joint proposal put forth by ACF and CMS will help coordinate efforts to build state and tribal capacity within child welfare and health care systems to more appropriately address the high rates of children who may be unnecessarily receiving psychotropic medications, often several at one time, even as few receive appropriate outpatient mental health services. The project will encourage the utilization of effective evidence-based therapeutic interventions, including therapeutic foster care, intensive in- home and community-based approaches, multisystemic therapy, and mobile response and stabilization services.
128 orgs to Congress: end over-prescription of psychotropics for children/youth in foster care: http://bit.ly/1P2T26W via @Campaign4Kids
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