26.3 Providing Integrated Care to Pregnant Teens in a School Setting

Objectives

Pregnant and parenting teenagers are a priority public health and mental health target for intervention; not only are the providers treating the mothers, they also promoting healthy mother–child dyads and healthy children in return. The goals are to examine unique strategies and culturally sensitive approaches to providing mental health treatment for pregnant teenage girls or parenting teenagers and their children in a school-based clinic.

Methods

Florence Crittenton High School, one of the largest and most comprehensive providers of services for pregnant and parenting teenagers in the state of Colorado, offers a venue for child and adolescent psychiatrists to provide accessible mental health services to at-risk female youth in inner city Denver. The presenters discuss how child and adolescent psychiatrists are integrated into a comprehensive medical clinic to provide mental health services, including medication management, mother-child

Results

Unique strategies and culturally sensitive approaches to engaging at-risk youth in the school and primary care clinical settings will be examined. The student population of Florence Crittenton is 82 percent Hispanic, 11.7 percent African American, 1.7 percent Native American, and 2.2 percent Caucasian. This population poses a need for culturally versed approaches, as many are leery of psychiatric services because of cultural beliefs, miseducation, and concerns that social services may get

Conclusions

School-based clinics represent a novel way to provide psychiatric services to children and adolescents. Continuing to expand on improving access to youth by working with pregnant or mother teenagers provides not only a novel way to address an adolescent population with care but also their young child with mental health services, making the greatest public health impact for two generations.

ADOL, ATTACH, SC