A key recommendation of Stanford’s mental health task force: make sure Counseling and Psychological Services has enough therapists. (One for every 1,000 to 1,500 students is recommended.) CAPS has staffed up, but meeting student demand for counseling is still a challenge. Psychiatrist Ronald Albucher, the newly appointed director, says that CAPS is seeing a 10 percent increase in new patients over last year, along with a 30 percent increase in students needing follow-up case management for medications. In one recent week, 63 new students sought help.
Students most frequently seek help for relationship concerns, depression, anxiety and self-esteem issues, and Albucher says most of them have been struggling for months or years with the problem before they come to CAPS. When a student calls or walks in, a receptionist takes down his or her basic information and then schedules a 20-minute triage phone appointment with a clinician—usually for that same day. It involves a basic assessment to identify the nature of the problem, its symptoms, whether the student is on medication, and if he or she has any therapist preferences. For example, a student who is just coming out may wish to work with a therapist with expertise in sexual orientation issues; CAPS will do its best to accommodate those wishes.
“A lot of the new funding we got was specifically for therapists to do that kind of triage or screening, to make sure we’re getting to students quickly,” says Albucher. And though the goal is to get every new student in for a full-fledged counseling session within a week, demand is so great that the waiting time is currently up to two weeks. CAPS provides short-term counseling when appropriate—six to 12 sessions—or refers students outside the University. Counselors are also offering more and more group treatments, including a cognitive behavioral therapy group for anxiety and depression, eating disorders group treatment, a meditation group, and relationship groups for previously underserved populations such as Asian- and African-Americans or the LGBT community.
Case management services, often for students so ill they’ve required hospitalization, stay within CAPS. Says Albucher, “We’re not just a psychological counseling clinic anymore.”
