WWAMI Rural Health Research Center

🚨 New Policy Report: Youth Behavioral Health in the Rural U.S. 🚨

We’ve published a new policy report synthesizing findings from nine briefs on the state of child and youth behavioral health in the rural U.S. The report covers topics including the prevalence of behavioral health conditions and substance use disorder among youth, the youth behavioral health workforce, the behavioral health licensure and reimbursement policy landscape, and the provision of youth behavioral health services.

Together these findings help build a comprehensive picture of rural youth mental and behavioral health.

📊 We’ll also be presenting these findings in an upcoming June webinar hosted on the Rural Health Research Gateway—details coming soon!

Read the full report on our website and stay tuned for the webinar announcement: https://bit.ly/436SWaM

⏰ One week to go until NRHA 2026!

The WWAMI Rural Health Research Center is looking forward to joining colleagues from across the rural health community next week in San Diego for the National Rural Health Association Annual Conference (May 19–22).

📣 If you’re attending, we hope you’ll join us for our sessions, where we’ll be sharing research on:
• Policy and Implementation Strategies for Marriage and Family Therapist (MFT) and Mental Health Counselor (MHC) Integration (Wed at 4pm📍in Coronado A)
• Trends in Medication Treatment for Opioid Use Disorder (Thurs at 9am📍in Balboa ABC)
• Rural Clinical Training Trends: Challenges and Solutions(Thurs at 10:45am 📍in La Jolla AB)
• Geographic Variation in Health Care Spending Across Rurality ( Thurs at 3:30pm📍in Coronado B)

Let’s meet up, exchange ideas, and keep the conversations going—at our sessions or in the hallways! See you soon, San Diego 🌴