Closing the Mental Health Provider Gap: Bellarmine’s New Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner Program

Bellarmine University’s Lansing School of Nursing has introduced a new Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner Program to address the shortage of mental health providers with nurse practitioner training. Dr. Chris Webb, the chair of Graduate Nursing at Bellarmine and director of the Family Nurse Practitioner Program, believes that this program will help close the gap in provider shortages and expand outreach and treatment for those in need, ultimately improving health outcomes for individuals.

According to the 2023 annual “State of Mental Health in America” report by nonprofit Mental Health America, over 50 million Americans, or about 20.8% of adults, experienced a mental illness in 2019-2020. Shockingly, more than half of these individuals, 54.7%, did not receive treatment. One of the contributing factors to this gap is the shortage of mental health providers in the U.S., where there are an estimated 350 individuals for every one mental health provider.

The Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner Program at Bellarmine University is designed to prepare professional nurses to provide psychiatric disease management and advanced psychotherapy techniques. This mostly online program can be completed in two years of part-time study, including two summers. Graduates of this program will be equipped to conduct psychiatric evaluations and provide treatment, helping to meet the growing demand for mental health services in the United States.