Wyandotte County residents need mental health services. Fast help is here | Opinion

A few years ago, a woman walked through the doors of Wyandot Behavioral Health Network carrying more than most people could bear: a decade of depression, a painful divorce and the daily weight of raising a child alone. Her daughter had experienced trauma of her own. She came to us skeptically, referred through the courts, but she came.

Through BHN’s PACES program, she found something she hadn’t expected: a therapist who helped her actually process her pain rather than just survive it. She learned to manage her anxiety, show up for her daughter and navigate a life that had once felt impossible. Slowly and steadily, she transformed.

Stories like this are exactly why Certified Community Behavioral Health Centers such as Wyandot PACES matter. They don’t just provide mental health services — they provide them immediately, to people who can’t afford to wait.

Nearly 1 in 5 young people in the U.S. experiences a mental, emotional, behavioral or developmental disorder. Rates of emotional distress among young people continue to climb. In 2023, 20% of high school students reported serious thoughts of suicide. Yet only 8 in 10 adolescents who need mental health services actually receive care. The crisis is deepening, and the gap between need and access remains unacceptably wide.

Far too often, young people in crisis, and their families, don’t know where to turn for the help they need.

Until five years ago, this was the situation here in Wyandotte County. Families faced rising mental health and substance use challenges and struggled to access timely care. Law enforcement and hospitals carried an unsustainable burden as police officers and emergency room staff were the responders of first resort.

But then Wyandot Behavioral Health Network began successfully answering these needs through our Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinic. These CCBHCs are designed to ensure that anyone can access mental health and substance use care whenever and however they need it, regardless of their ability to pay. That means immediate crisis response, same-day access to services, care coordination and connections to primary care and social supports.

Now, when a crisis happens, families no longer face a maze of disconnected systems. Since 2022, the Wyandot PACES program has served 2,000 Wyandotte County families each year with immediate help and a clear path forward, without waiting hours in an emergency room or months for an appointment.

PACES has clear and accessible entry points. Young people and their families can walk into our office in western Kansas City, Kansas. They can call us. They can connect through our website. They can be referred by one of the four school districts we partner with through the University of Kansas’ IRIS or Unite Us programs. When a family walks through our doors, they are greeted by our customer care representatives and quickly connected to an intake coordinator and access team clinician. We open a medical record, assess needs and begin building a plan.

When a behavioral health emergency prompts a 911 call in Wyandotte County, help arrives quickly. A crisis intervention team officer and mental health co-responder are dispatched and typically reach their destination within minutes. Both are trained clinicians who work side by side with law enforcement to deescalate situations, provide trauma-informed care and connect people in need to services that help.

PACES also expands access through remote video, late-night and weekend appointments to make it even easier for families to get their children the help they need. Telehealth services, in particular, ensure that nearly 100 children in foster care continue to receive therapy and medication even when they move outside Wyandotte County — a critical transition period when care too often falls through the cracks.

CCBHCs today are part of the fabric of care in 40% of U.S. counties, serving an estimated 3 million people and strengthening entire communities by reducing emergency room use and freeing up law enforcement resources to focus on fighting crime. By investing in care coordination, crisis response and partnerships with schools and community providers, we are building a stronger system — one that meets people earlier, prevents crises when possible and responds effectively when they do occur.

For Wyandot Behavioral Health Network and our community, this isn’t just a policy model. It’s a commitment: that no family has to face a mental health or substance use crisis alone, and that expert, compassionate help is available immediately and close to home. We launched this model because our community needed it. Today, it’s changing lives — and building a healthier, safer Wyandotte County for all of us.

As one young person who received services said: “After a few years of working with this team, I found myself accomplishing more and more every day.”

That kind of progress — one person, one family at a time — is why the Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinic model matters.

Randy Callstrom has served as president and CEO of the 501(c)(3) nonprofit Wyandot Behavioral Health Network since 2014.

This story was originally published April 10, 2026 at 5:07 AM.