Grand Opening

Why open a QRTP?

Saint Francis Ministries saw the need to bring the very first QRTP model to Texas to create greater access to a higher level of care for youth with immediate mental and behavioral health needs. Opening a facility in the Panhandle allows families to be more active in a child’s treatment and recovery and promotes positive permanency outcomes for children in out-of-home care.

This is a significant benefit to young Texans in the child welfare system and to families in each of our communities who are working their hardest to become stronger, safer, and more resilient caregivers. Saint Francis has the knowledge and expertise to help some of the 120 high-needs youth being displaced from their home communities each day. We are putting together the resources needed to build a transformative treatment model in our own community, and with it, a tool to bring our children home

Services adapt to needs of the individual

A varied range of evidence-based, trauma-informed services in place at the QRTP allows Saint Francis Residential – Texas to reach out to young people in multiple ways. We offer Equine Therapy, Substance Use Counseling, Individual and Group Therapy, Psychosocial Services, Nursing, Independent Living Training, and Trauma Direct Care.

A child receives the treatment identified by their assessment as being most needed and most impactful. The QRTP model is specifically intended to provide greater benefits to children who are in out-of-home care. Youth in foster care receive treatment with others who share their experiences, which can create greater empathy and synergy in treatment rather than alienation in a group where a child may be the only one who is in foster care.

A few facts

Research on the QRTP model shows the positive effect that family involvement and the involvement of a child’s natural supports has on those who are in inpatient treatment (i.e., siblings, relatives, friends, teachers, mentors, and those to whom their sense of natural self and well-being is tied); behavioral outcomes as a result of that involvement; and associated permanency outcomes.

Family engagement and connection is associated with improved outcomes for youth receiving residential interventions and for youth in the child welfare system, including greater likelihood for positive social and behavioral outcomes and decreased risk of serious behavior problems.

Consistency of contact and engagement between youth and family members is important; youth whose parents visit more frequently are more likely to achieve reunification and frequency of visits was correlated with permanency both at and six months after discharge from the treatment program.

The support of family members, siblings, and other natural supports (i.e., supports existing outside of a child’s involvement in the child welfare system) were cited by youth as being very important, as well as being integral to creating a sense of their history and identity. Lack of supportive connections such as these can complicate the fact that youth receiving residential treatment are likely to have experienced multiple out-of-home placements prior to inpatient treatment and struggle with permanency post-discharge.