Children First for Oregon

Oregon Drug Rules Tighten for Foster Children

6/15/2010, 12:11 a.m. PDT
MICHELLE COLE

(AP) — PORTLAND, Ore. - Justin Snegirev mostly remembers feeling nauseous, tired and alone during the more than seven years he spent in state foster care.

Placed in a foster home when he was 8, Snegirev says it wasn’t long before he was prescribed Ritalin, a drug used to treat attention deficit disorders. Next came an antidepressant and then a sleeping pill. Between ages 8 and 15, Snegirev says he was given at least seven different types of psychiatric drugs.

But he wasn’t mentally ill, says Snegirev, now 20. “I was in an abusive situation and was a kid who simply was expressing symptoms of abuse-and nobody was listening to me.”

As of July 1, Oregon will have a new law and new rules to ensure closer scrutiny of psychiatric drugs given to kids living in foster homes.

The change follows a November 2007 investigation by The Oregonian that found children in foster care were prescribed powerful psychiatric medications at four times the rate of other children covered by Medicaid. The investigation also noted that foster parents were paid more if children were on psychiatric medications.

A state audit the next year found one in five children in foster care was prescribed at least one psychiatric medication. The audit also found medication logs missing from child welfare files, poor communication between caseworkers and foster parents about medication and few children receiving timely mental health assessments as required by law.

New state data show those assessments still happen only half the time. Between October 2009 and January 2010, 55 percent of the children entering Oregon foster care had a mental health assessment within the first 60 days.

Officials say that will have to change under the new law. Children must have a mental health assessment before they are given any anti-psychotic drug or more than one of another type of psychiatric drug. There will also be mandatory medication reviews for children under age 6 who are taking psychiatric medications and for older kids with more than two psychiatric prescriptions.

In addition to the new law, the Department of Human Services has new rules on consent for psychiatric medications. In the past, the decision was left to the doctor and foster parents. Now, a child welfare manager must approve.

Changes made last year mean foster parents do not automatically get a higher rate simply because a child takes a psychiatric drug. Advocates for children support the shift of consent from the foster parent to child welfare manager. Read the Entire Article