(KFF Health News) – Nationwide, psychiatric “boarding” — when a patient waits in the emergency room after providers decide to admit the person — has increased because of a rise in suicide attempts, among other mental health issues, and a shortage of inpatient psychiatric beds, according to a study of 40 hospitals in the journal Pediatrics. It found the number of cases in which children spent at least two days in pediatric hospitals before being transferred for psychiatric care also increased 66% from 2017 through 2023 to reach 16,962 instances.

St. Louis Children’s Hospital leaders aim to address that problem by opening a 77-bed pediatric mental health hospital in the suburb of Webster Groves. But as often happens with such proposals, neighbors objected. They worry it would worsen safety and lower property values.

Over the past decade, proposed psychiatric facilities for minors in California, Colorado, Iowa, Nebraska, and New York have also faced local resistance. (Read More)