DCFS 'Inhumane' To Keep Kids In Psych Wards Unnecessarily: Suit

CHICAGO — A federal class action lawsuit accuses the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services of keeping hundreds of children in its care locked in psychiatric hospitals long after doctors have cleared them for release.

Not only does the practice cause "immense harm" to children, it is also a tremendous waste of money by the state child welfare agency, as taxpayers have been made to spend millions of dollars to pay for an unconstitutional and inhumane practice, according to a complaint filed Tuesday in Chicago.

Acting Cook County Public Guardian Charles Golbert is the lead plaintiff on the suit and joined by a group of minors in DCFS care. The agency had made a mockery of the Hippocratic Oath to "first, do no harm," he said, announcing the suit.

“The harm to these youth that DCFS is committing by locking them up long after they’ve completed their courses of treatment is incalculable," Golbert said. "It’s an abject moral and human rights failure.”

The lawsuit said the state agency has been aware of the problem for at least three decades without ending the practice of holding children beyond medically necessity, despite a consent decree in federal court requiring DCFS not to hospitalize children longer than medically necessary. Instead of complying, the problem has gotten worse, the suit said.

Nearly 30 percent of children who the agency sent to psychiatric hospitals were held after being cleared for discharge, according to the suit, citing DCFS data.

The number of children held longer than needed increased dramatically during the administration of outgoing Gov. Bruce Rauner, according to the data.

In 2014, there were 88 children kept in psychiatric hospitals longer than medically necessary. By 2017, there were 301 children in DCFS care held beyond medical necessity.

Of the more than 800 children who remained hospitalized without medical necessity, 80 percent waited more than 10 days, more than 40 percent had to wait more than a month and 15 percent were confined for two months or longer.

In 2018 so far, the practice has cost taxpayers a minimum of $126,000 a month, as calculated by the extra cost of "warehousing" kids in psychiatric wards beyond medical necessity compared to the next most expensive option available, according to the lawsuit.

The price tag on unnecessary hospitalizations would rise significantly if any of the children could have been placed in less restrictive or expensive settings such as specialized foster care.

According to an investigation by ProPublica Illinois published in June, DCFS spent almost $7 million between 2015 and 2017 in medically unnecessary hospitalizations.

The suit names the agency, its acting director, its directors for the past decade and 19 of its employees in who contributed to failing to provide placements to children being held after doctors cleared them for discharge. They include the agency's guardianship administrators, deputy directors for clinical practice and clinical and child services, supervisors of its matching unit and its psychiatric hospitalization project.

More minors are expected to be added to the case if it is allowed to move forward as a class action. The law firm Loevy & Loevy, which specializes in areas of civil rights and governmental misconduct and has filed multiple class actions on behalf of detainees in Illinois, is representing Golbert and the children. The health of several of the children named as plaintiffs deteriorated as a result of being held for months longer than medically needed, according to the complaint.

One of the plaintiffs said she was ready to leave a psychiatric hospital after several weeks but became more depressed as the agency's process to allow her to move in with an older sister stretched for months in 2014 and 2015. The girl, who was 13 at the time, became suicidal, was bullied by other patients and forced by an employee to perform sexual acts, ProPublica reported.

In a statement in response to the lawsuit, the agency noted that "beyond medical necessity" is an insurance term and not the same as a doctor's decision about the readiness of a patient for discharge. Some foster homes or treatment centers will not accept children with certain health conditions, it said, and the state is in serious need of more resources to handle the complex behavioral and physical health needs of children and teens.

"Rebuilding the capacity of the mental health system will require more than a lawsuit," it said, pointing to $20 million in additional service contracted over the past year. It said the difficultly in finding placements for children in psychiatric hospitals is part of a "decades-long problem" with the state's health care system.