Screenings for depression seek to save kids

More schools try to gauge students' mental health.

Jeff and Jennifer Miller lost their son to what they call “perfectly hidden depression.”

Tristan was smart and musically and athletically talented as a junior at Zane Trace High School near Chillicothe. There was nothing about his demeanor that would indicate he was fighting an inner battle.

The first clue came too late, in the form of a letter Tristan left to his parents on Nov. 12, 2017, the day he took his life.

“He described how he felt and what he struggled with,” Jennifer Miller said. “He self-diagnosed his anxiety and depression, but he had not reached out for help. He didn’t think anything could help him.”

Amid their intense grief, the Millers soon began focusing on how they could help others avoid the same fate.

In May 2018, six months after Tristan’s death, they were in a meeting with Zane Trace school officials, joined by John Ackerman, suicide-prevention coordinator in the Center for Suicide Prevention and Research at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus.

That fall, Zane Trace schools implemented the Signs of Suicide program, which features training for school employees, informational meetings with parents and screenings of students through surveys.

“We just decided to be as proactive as possible,” said Zane Trace High principal Ty Wertman. “We shifted the narrative in the district to focus on the social and emotional status of our kids above all else.”

Zane Trace is one of many central Ohio school districts that have made that commitment in recent years. Districts have been beefing up their programs to address not only youth suicide but mental health issues in general.

Ackerman said that when the suicide center at Nationwide Children’s began in 2015, school officials were not as receptive to the idea of bringing suicide-prevention training into their districts.

“Now, we use data and talk about what successes we’ve had, and now people are saying, ‘This is something we are seeing every day, and our staff is scared, so let’s do something about it,’” he said. “It’s definitely a different dynamic, and people are ready to talk about it.”

Ohio law has required mental health training in schools since 2013, and the state has increased the hours required since then.

But those requirements are not the only reason schools are adding these programs, administrators say.

“From what I’ve seen in the last five years, (students’) anxiety levels have ramped up,” said Mike Abraham, Hilliard’s director of student well-being. “We’ve seen a spike.”

Abraham’s position is 2 years old. By 2018, the district had implemented enough mental health initiatives to warrant creating a position solely to oversee these efforts.

Ackerman said Nationwide Children’s has screened about 47,000 students in more than 150 schools in 20 Ohio counties since 2015.

Syntero, a counseling and mental health services company with several locations in central Ohio, also offers school-support and screening programs.

By the end of this school year, Syntero officials said, they will have screened more than 12,000 students in 12 central Ohio districts since 2018.

Both programs are virtually free for most schools; the only fees (maybe a few hundred dollars, Ackerman said) are incurred if schools want follow-up materials after the program is completed.

Nationwide Children’s views its efforts as an investment, Ackerman said, hopefully preventing the cost of treating future acute mental illnesses.

In Franklin County, Syntero’s school programs are covered by the county’s Alcohol, Drug and Mental Health Board.

Typically, the screenings take place twice a year, usually focused on grades 6 through 12 but in some cases beginning as early as fourth grade.