---decrease stigma for young people coping with mental illness.

Please, though we adults have bee taught that prejudice, we do not have to teach it to our children.

The newly-expanded Children's Hospital scheduled to open in 2017 will offer 821,000 sq feet of space and promises to deliver ". . . care for virtually all pediatric and obstetric conditions . . . while caring for emotional needs as well." Web Link Yet, this world-class hospital will not offer a single bed for anyone under 18 who is having a mental health crisis. The excellent doctors and nurses in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at LPCH are desperate to treat our children in their time of greatest need. At minimum, they should have access to those patients who are fortunate enough to end up at Mills when they are sent away from Stanford to receive treatment. It's shameful that our children will continue to be sent away at all.
(I would also add that, in addition to the ASPIRE program through El Camino Hospital, Bay Area Children's Association also offers a very well-regarded outpatient program as well as an excellent team of MFTs and Child/Adolescent psychiatrists.)