clinician

support specialist

therapist

registered nurse

mobility specialist

Burrell-Behavioral-Health

I was a CCS for Burrell in Springfield for a year (2013-2014) before moving to a different state. By the end of my time there, I was jaded with Medicaid and the services Burrell was providing. We were told to meet with clients for so many hours a week to meet productivity, if you did not meet productivity, your job was at risk. Sometimes this was difficult to do depending on your caseload because clients loved to cancel, which left you scrambling to meet with anyone you could in order to keep your job. I would sit with the same client for 1 to 2 hours in order to meet productivity.

But, everything changed. I began working at Burrell again as a CCS in 2023, this time in Branson Missouri. You now had to meet with at least 23 clients a week to meet productivity. They give bonuses if you meet with 25 or more. Which always felt weird to me that a non-for-profit company would give you bonuses to meet with more people when the money was coming from Medicaid, a taxpayer funded entity. 

Anyway, I had a case of 35 people about 4 months in. I was meeting with some of the same people multiple times a week, just to read their junk mail to them for 15 minutes (I was told to do this by the CCS Supervisor.) I was meeting with people with goals that clearly could not be accomplished. For example, someone who lived 20 to 30 minutes outside of Branson and away from any of the other small towns surrounding it and did not have a vehicle, wanted to get a job. He was suicidal and had no one to turn to, except me. I met with him for several weeks before he finally stopped meeting with me because I couldn't really help him, but we sure billed Medicaid for each meeting with him. Luckily, my supervisor would inspect my notes to make sure they were properly worded so that, even reading someone's junk mail for them, would pass medical necessity inspection.

I was then given a difficult client that had been passed around the other 3 CCSs before my supervisor chose to stick him with me. Because of his own actions, he became homeless. Which I took personally and felt like a failure because I wasn't able to prevent it. We tried OACAC, they gave him a backpack with a tent in it and were no help at all. The client ended up in front of the Branson Burrell location where he sat for hours. One day, my last day, I sat with him for 2 hours to listen to him and attempt to comfort him. He had 2 dogs with him, whose feet were bleeding from walking so much. My supervisor, we'll call her R.N., comes out to ask what I'm doing. She then proceeds to instigate the situation, causing the client to become aggravated. She asks me if we are done here, then tells me to go inside. She walks inside; I didn't follow. I continued to sit with this now homeless man outside of the office on a bench. The supervisor returns about 5-10 minutes later with another backpack with a tent. I guess the client now has 2 tents, one for him and a house for his dogs. I quit the next day when my supervisor proceeded to jump on me through text messages about getting my notes turned in and how I had let notes go late due to sitting with the homeless client. I quit. Money over people. 

Also, while working at the Branson, MO location, I noticed odd relationships between the supervisor and another older male CCS as well. There was definitely some kind of "clicky" behavior going on.

I hate leaving bad reviews. I am not that kind of person. But if it can save someone some grief, i'll do it. 
I'm not even sure where to start. 
The only thing that keeps me at this job is the people i work with. We have a great team. 
Burrell seemed to be headed in a really good direction until more recently. More recently, Burrell has decided to restructure. We have now become the definition of too many chiefs and not enough indians. This has done nothing but caused SO many problems, especially for county clinics. 
Oh lets talk about county clinics. We are the red headed step children of the business. We are expected to run and operate just as Columbia and Springfield but with not even 1/4 of the resources and programs they have. They have started throwing around the phrase "zero variance" like its confetti . It doesn't work. It's not going to work. So stop. 
I used to really feel that this company truly cared about client care, but now its all about business and money. Oh you can't meet your spend down? SORRY WE CAN'T SEE YOU. WHAT?! wow. We used to be able to help someone in a crisis the same day even if they weren't enrolled yet, now we basically have to turn them away because we can't "bill" for them. You see what i'm saying? It is more important to upper management that i meet productivity rather than to provide good care to my clients. Maybe i don't meet my numbers, but if they would take the time to ask my clients, i am good at my job and they receive great care from me. 
Next on the list of complaints is communication. Communication between management and us little people, is terrible. I truly believe that goes along with too many chiefs and not enough Indians. You ask one person in charge a question and get one answer, but then get a different answer from someone else later. It just doesn't make sense. It makes it hard to do the job.
I don't feel appreciated. I feel like i am walking on eggshells constantly. 
My direct supervisor is new and was given basically no guidance. She had two direct supervisors who gave her different answers all of the time which has caused chaos and uneasiness within our clinic. 
If you take off when you don't have time, you could potentially get into trouble.  If i choose to take off a day but don't get paid for it, that's only hurting me, so bug off. Building time at Burrell is almost impossible anyway. 

Also our insurance is terrible, and they want $400 extra a month to insure my infant. NO THANKS. 

I will end with a couple of positives.
I truly believe that the CEO is trying hard to make things right, but a lot of the stuff that goes on in central region and county clinics are so far from his radar that there's just no way he can really help.

I believe that the central region operations team is wonderful. They are really trying to help. I can see it, and i can feel it. 

Why do i still work here? The pay is good for the area I live in, and i actually enjoy my JOB. I enjoy my clients. Don't get me wrong i am actively seeking employment elsewhere. I am just hoping and praying that this will get better at some point.

Where do I even begin... I first started working at Burrell and yes it was good at the beginning but over time they slowly got worse and worse, which was surprising to me because they at one point changed their logo to "best place to work". Without making this review drag on and on I will just make it to the point. 

Burrell has the worst communication skills I have ever seen in a company. Everyday I felt like something changed without me knowing or approving. 

I noticed all the other middle management coworkers start to jump ship and it kinda concerned me for awhile.  

The pay is garbage, everyone got a raise around me except me. It made me really feel like I was not doing a good job or something but at the same time I was confused because I thought "if I am not doing a good job then why was I given so much responsibility and why have I not seen my boss for a year?". I was always left with a mix feeling. 

The location I worked at was very dangerous, constant drive by shootings with no one in the company caring about that. 

Lack of support form upper management. Got a question about how to handle a sensitive issue, not sure what to do about a certain thing?Well figure it out on your own because good luck with your boss ever answering their phone calls, texts or emails. 

Rumors spread like wild fire there. If you do not play office politics you will not go far. One of my coworkers out there was great but she was very outgoing and some people in the company did not like that. Several times I had people tell me very bad things about her even though they did not know her. I also had another incident where after I left I was at a low point and asked if I could come back to work doing my old job (I was PRN so i figured no big deal). I had only sent my boss a text about this so she only knew that I was asking for my job back. I then over heard the pharmacist talking to one of my old coworkers saying "I heard he was begging for his job back" talking about me. So it made me again feel like I was not valued and that a lot of people there did not like me for some reason. 

All in all this is NOT the best place to work. It is a decent place to get a start in social work but this should never be anyone's end goal. I worked there for 3 years and I thank them for giving me a chance and helping me get started but in the end they screwed me over time and time again. I ended up finding a different job and staying on PRN to help them manage the project I was working on and then one day I just received an email telling me to fill out an exit survey on my employment. So no one ended up telling me that they didn't even need my help anymore they just email me something. I guess why am I not surprised. I hope they get their stuff together because they have some decent employees there and they have some great clients/consumers that they serve.

A typical day at ACSU: Look over client charts, check work e mail to make sure there are no memos, set up morning medications. Some days get rough righ at the start, due to medication changes, high levels of stress, and/ or various mental illnesses some clients will be drowsy and hard to awaken. Due to the agreement for treatment, wich encompasses the daily schedual for the facility, Clients are held to a pretty ridgid schedual. Positive re- enforcement, sometimes constant, helps most clients deal with schedual changes and focusing on therapy. The therapist will give clients 'homework'. Staff such as I check up on the progress their making, are available to process with clients points regarding thier therapy. I've learne so much working here! There is an online continuing education forum that I access frequently. I've taken courses ranging in topic from Mood Disorders, to Developmental milestones, to Geriatric psych. This is definately more than a job. I enjoy coming to work, meeting a variety of people, learning about the unique struggles that a person with mental illness goes through. This is a topic that facinates me, and played a major role in my decision to become a nurse. Most of my Co Workers are highly intelligent, educated people who genuinely care about what they do and the impact that we have on people's lives. I've enjoyed working here, there isn't a whole lot of undue 'drama', and personality clashes are delt with professionaly. The hardest part of the job I would say is not feeling like I have management's support when there is a staff member who does not show the level of tactfullness or professionality that this work requires, who is perpetually late, and/ or puts other staff members and/ or clients at risk. Then turning around and holding 'dependable' staff to a higher standard of care. Basicly, I am seeking employment elsewhere due to inequality amoung staff members and the conviction that my nursing licence is more valuble than some one else's mistake.

This company is what is wrong with healthcare.  They backdoor ways to get people care who don't need care simply to bill the state (sometimes double bill the state).  Once the state wakes up, Burrell will cease to exist. They were once even fixing the books per se, to charge clients more so the clients net pay could qualify for services and then Burrell would charge them over $260 for ONE, 8 minute session... with CSS's that have no idea what they are doing because Burrell hires people with any degree not counseling degrees usually.  It's a scam.  
     They also are not lenient on doing what the employee needs to stay healthy in the job demanding they stay for the sake of the team blah blah blah when bottom line is, they don't care that you are driving say 80 miles a day to work and back when there is another facility of theirs you are qualified to work at only 4 minutes from your house.  NO COMMON SENSE and they DO NOT support the MENTAL health of their own employees.  
     These employees are doing the work of counselors without a PROPER DEGREE.  They are taught to put in their notes things like "COACHING, or EDUCATING" instead of counseling just so they don't get in hot fire with the state.  The boss' simply COACH the CSS' how to write and say and twist the truth as to cover their butts.  CSS' should get paid 100 dollars an hour for what they do, some driving thousands of miles to and from clients houses a year... for cents on the dollar. They put up with HORRIFIC PSYCHOLOGICAL tales of people's abuses and then are just LEFT to deal with it day in day out up to 30 or more clients a week (sometimes seen twice!)  It doesn't take long before even the strongest CSS breaks and can't take the day in day out hearing of abuse from clients and then knowing and feeling in their heart of hearts that Burrell doesn't care anything about that person other than getting their FULL PAY for an 8 min session (session can just include asking 5 questions - writing down responses and writing that you coached or educated the client how to respond to this stress) UGH>>> Don't bother, they won't be around long once the state figures out what they are really up to.

When I first started here, I was excited. People seemed friendly and helpful, and I figured there was just a learning curve and things would stabilize and get better. After a year, I realized they would not.

They make it sound like the pay is great; go work for a private practice you will deff make more working less. They combined sick and annual leave into straight pto, which is fine, but then they actually gave us less paid time off while trying to make it sound like more as well as took away some holidays. Took away benefits for part timers. No one could realistically afford the medical plans and they got worse every year. Gave a merit raise then took it away by giving everyone a raise. Promise bonuses, but then decided to had in stringent guidelines so that it was a lot harder to get without decreasing the quality of services. Don't pay client access a livable wage and hire essentially anyone with a pulse for those jobs which leads to a lot of scheduling and customer service issues. Had multiple supervisors, none of them had my back or stood up for me, and was actually told I needed to allow parents to curse at me, scream at me and threaten my wellbeing or I would get written up for poor customer service. No way. Was given a contract that was signed to work from home and was guilt tripped into continuing to need to work in person despite my disability; it has been a year and was never honored. Constantly changing policies. My last supervisor did not understabd the functions or requirements of my job. Got yelled at for having an fmla claim for my disability. Never told thank you for my hard work. Constant criticism. Can't even say I regularly got a paycheck as mine was messed up 6 pay periods in a row and was gaslighted that it wasn't. Gaslighted about having computer issues by condenscending IT staff. Never ending meetings that take away from client care but also all about the numbers.

Just don't. This is probably the second worst mental health agency in town, almost anywhere would be better.

Working in the Referral Office was like the movie The Mean Girls. If you didn't suck up to the supervisor she didn't like you. She has her favorites and if they dont like you well be prepared they will make your work experience there a horrible one. Our weekly meetings when she did attend would consist of her talking about how she drank because of her job and her political beliefs. If you don't agree with her political/religious beliefs she will let you go. Why these topics were talked about during work meetings are unbenonced to me. She comes in late and leaves early so when you need assistance she's no where to be found. She would talk about how she was bisexual and how she partied and was so wasted the weekend before in the middle of the office while other employees were on the phone with clients. We would have to put the clients on mute or hold during those conversations so they couldn't be heard in till it was over. She would talk about employees with other employees. Throwing f bombs while employees were on the phone with clients was a common occurrence with her and another employee. Employees throw temper tantrums on a daily basis. The lead has no backup when trying to do her job even though she's asked multiple times. The job is stressful, the pay does not match the job duties. The office is completely unorganized and when you have suggestions on how to make it better or more organized your ideas are shot down or ignored. 20 min hold times for clients and employees refusing to take calls. Policy changes daily. Providers cancelling clients same day as their apts multiple times in a row which equals to clients not being seen for months at a time and a lot of times with out medications. There is not proper communication between the providers and the referral office. Computer systems are outdated and slow. All which leads to horrible client care. I would say the whole experience was petty and the maturity level of the office was equivalent of a Jr High student.

I have worked for Burrell for over two years now, and have seen its best…and its worst. I’ll start with the good, and that is mostly the benefits and the pay, though it could be a bit better given the amount of expectations are laid out.  Above all, there is little to no transparency or adequate communication between chain of command, or between departments. No one knows what each person does, and there is often a lot of confusion about who can do what. Finding a job description is impossible. Productivity is far too high, with expectations that are unrealistic for the populations Burrell is allegedly committed to serving. To further this, when concerns regarding safety, productivity, and burn out are brought up to senior leadership, it is met with patronization no actual solutions offered.  A lot of “we hear you, but…” basically, nothing is going to change no matter how much or how many employees collectively bring light to these concerns. I cannot count how many times I’ve been told to utilize PTO to recover from burn out, but always come back to the same conditions. As an organization that is worth more than a quarter of a billion dollars, that is very clearly trying to monopolize the mental health field in the region, you would hope at the very least the organization would do better at making sure their employees are semi-comfortable. It has never been more apparent that Burrell cares more about being perceived as “the best place to work” than ACTUALLY being the best place to work.  It’s in quotations for a reason. 

I worked there for 5+ years and almost every day there was always some drama going down with the office manager and the regional office manager. They had the mentality of high schoolers and were very non professional...cursing employees and being dictatorial and making demands outside their scope of knowledge and education. Every DON they hired had never worked in mental health and had never been in a clinic setting. The health care plan is next to nothing. If you leave before 3 years you will not get paid for any unused vacation. If the clinic has to close because of weather then you have to use vacation. The rank and file employees are very nice and all are looking for jobs elsewhere as the pay scale is terrible. I left and got an $50,000 dollar raise. The program director is about as professional as a rock...I have seen her walking down the hallway barefoot and wearing flip flops but will then criticize other staff for their dress. Keep looking elsewhere if you are a physician. They will make you work at both clinics treating patients you don't know and working with nurses you don't know and the DON will NEVER help out...she's too busy texting on her phone. The DON is the supervisor of physicians...how ridiculous is that? They expect you to document while talking to the client but none of them has ever done that so they don't know that's impossible and the client feels very left out.You will be assigned a nurse but they can take them away without notice which upsets your clients as they have learned to trust a good nurse but management doesn't care about client satisfaction in reality but only say they do for marketing and inspection purposes.

What is the best part of working at the company?
I was a DSP so the hours were very flexible and it was very nice. 

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
Well job details weren’t super clear and management expected you to know things they had never gone over with you on and would freely yell and freak out on you in their office which was private but could easily hear outside their office. So all the others in the office area definitely knew this manager was yelling at people like that and didn’t report it. Very little support on ideas to do with your clients, DSPs should be creative as well, but it shouldn’t be their sole responsibility to research free/cheap events for clients receiving DSP services. DSP are essentially parent, educator, counselor,  fitness coach, housekeeper, cna, sometimes even medication administrator and behavioralist all rolled into one, what exactly is the manager doing if they’re not at least superior communicators and helping the DSP research things to do in the community? 

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
It was very weird. Some areas were very relaxed and friendly while still professional and some areas were very cold and uncomfortable. I’m not sure if that has changed it has been a few years. 

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
Well as long as my manager didn’t call it was usually just working with the clients. If they called it was usually very stressful and I often ended up crying won’t event lie.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Clinician 20 salaries reported	$59,610 per year
Support specialist 3 salaries reported	$22.33 per hour
Therapist 3 salaries reported	$63,920 per year
Registered nurse 4 salaries reported	$27.25 per hour
Mobility specialist 4 salaries reported	$19.47 per hour

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