Group gives N.C. 'D' for mental health care

Raleigh, N.C. — A grassroots nonprofit group has given North Carolina a "D" grade for its public mental health system, alleging there have been years of poor decision-making.

“Years of bad policy decisions have left emergency rooms, the criminal justice system and families to shoulder the burden of responding to people living with mental illness in crisis,” said Debra G. Dihoff, executive director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness North Carolina. “Our grade reflects the chaos and disorganization in our state.”

The national report is a follow-up to one published three years ago to measure states' progress in achieving the goals of a presidential commission that called for transforming the mental health care system.

NAMI gave North Carolina a "D" in the previous report, too, and it is one of 23 states that saw no change this year. The national average is "D," remaining stagnant from three years ago. Six states received "B's." Six received "Fs." No state got an "A."

The report card is based on 65 criteria, including access to medication, housing, family education and support to National Guard members.

It includes policy recommendations for federal and state leaders. State governments provided most of the information on which the grades are based.

15 Comments

WRAL.com welcomes your comments on this story. All comments are moderated prior to publication based on our posting guidelines. Please review them prior to posting and if your message is not approved.

VIEW ALL 15 COMMENTS

This story is closed for comments. Comments on WRAL.com news stories are accepted and moderated between the hours of 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. Monday through Friday.

Latest Comments

"Bev" Perdue had 8 years as Lt. Governor, which is really a figure head position. Oh "Beeevvvv"...why isn't mental health fixed in NC like you promised?

PaulRevere
March 11, 2009 3:04 p.m.

I've worked for 2 local community Mental Health Agencies where 1 quit operating their county clinic all together and the other is barely hanging by a split thread as we speak. Both, worked with the low income to poverty stricken population who had either Medicaid, Medicare, or no insurance at all. You know, the population the big agencies don't want that pretty much only survives based on what the great State of NC thinks it's worth to pay someone to treat them for their mental illness or Developmental Delay (form., mental retardation) and of course, the monies from the too poor to live but not poor enough to qualify for Medicaid.

I am also a person with a serious form of mental illness and must seek services from the same agency or agencies of which I worked in and around with. I have no insurance, unemployed now, and not poor enough for Medicaid.

I've seen this mess from both sides. A "D" was a gracious gift!

sceeter
March 11, 2009 2:58 p.m.

HEY OLD PIRATE 2!!!

The only reason that servicemembers coming from Iraq & Afghanistan seem to be having more mental health issues is because nowadys it actually gets reported and the military chain-of-command can't ignore it like they used to!