If your child is struggling, you’re not alone.
Studies show: 50% of adolescents ages 13 to 18 have a mental health condition. 1 in 6 children ages 2 to 8 have a mental, behavioral or development disorder.
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Mental and Behavioral Health
Mental Health Matters
Boys Town is home to a one-of-a-kind mental health environment with a full range of compassionate, effective behavioral healthcare specialists who collaborate with Boys Town Pediatricians, Neurologists and other specialty providers. Our founder, Father Flanagan, had a holistic, healthy “mind, body, and spirit" philosophy and we continue to follow in his footsteps today.
Father Flanagan
"It is important that we know now to cure diphtheria, but it is vastly more important that we know how to prevent diphtheria." - Fr. Flanagan, 1946
More from Our Founder
24/7 Crisis Hotline
Boys Town National Hotline has taken more than 10.5 million calls since opening in 1989 and prevented 9,000 suicides in 2021 alone. We’re here to help.
800-448-3000
Support for EVERYONE
Boys Town offers online mental health support for EVERYONE. With more than 100 years of experience helping and healing children and families, we are using this experience to support those fighting the invisible battle of staying mentally healthy every day. We have a wide variety of articles, coping tools, expert curated Q&As submitted by real families like yours on Parenting.org. Plus, we have our award-winning Your Life, Your Voice site for kids, teens and tweens.
24/7 Crisis Hotline
The Boys Town National Hotline® is accredited by the American Association of Suicidology (AAS) and is open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Boys Town Crisis Counselors are trained in suicidology, crisis de-escalation, safety planning, and Nebraska resource navigation. We offer Spanish-speaking counselors and translation services for more than 100 languages. Plus, you'll find email available for speech- or hearing-impaired individuals and text messaging on YourLifeYourVoice.org. The Hotline also takes calls for the National Suicide Hotline at 988.
The Right Level of Care at the Right Time
Behavioral Health Services designed to meet the individual needs of each child and their family. This array of services benefits children and adolescents who need less intensive outpatient services, as well as those facing serious mental health disorders requiring intensive treatment.
- Outpatient Psychology
- Outpatient Psychiatry
- Psychiatric Residential Treatment Center
- Inpatient Psychiatric Care
Advanced Neurobehavioral Research
For the past 30 years the Boys Town Child and Family Translational Research Center (TRC) has used evidence-based research to improve the quality of child and family services to help Boys Town address the complex problems we face in society.
Recently Boys Town Institute for Human Neuroscience has added the use of MRI, MEG and OPM to assist the research team in defining normal brain development in children and identifying the impact of traumatic experiences on brain development, as well as brain changes associated with the emergence of psychiatric conditions like anxiety disorders, depression or schizophrenia.
How to Stop Negative Thoughts
Most kids misbehave sometimes. Some children, however, exhibit more extreme behaviors that require additional attention or correction.
Parenting a Child with Anxiety
Everyone has some anxiety, but what should you do when your child's anxiety disrupts normal activities?
Cyberbullying
Keeping up with technology can seem like a never-ending task for parents.
Losing a Friend to Suicide
I'm hurting so much, one of my friends killed herself today and I keep crying. Don't know how to tell my parents.