Giving Compass' Take:

• This Healio post examines a Journal of Adolescent Health study that revealed how college students of color have more unmet mental health needs than their white peers.

• What are the root causes of this and what can we do to fix this disparity? Nonprofits need to look at wellness programs that promote more equity on college campuses and address the needs of minority students.

• Here's how we can change the conversation around mental health on college campuses and erase stigmas.

Study findings published in the Journal of Adolescent Health showed significant disparities in treatment across race/ethnicity among college students with mental health problems.

College students of color had greater levels of unmet mental health needs relative to white students, according to results from the nationally representative study.

“There is enormous unmet need for mental health services in college student populations writ large, and students of color represent a disparities population based on even greater unmet mental health needs relative to white students,” Sarah Ketchen Lipson, PhD, EdM, from Boston University School of Public Health , said in a press release. “Understanding and addressing the mental health needs of racially diverse students is essential to supporting their success and creating equity in other dimensions, including persistence and retention.”

Lipson and colleagues examined the prevalence of mental health problems and treatment utilization among more than 13,000 college students of color using data from 43,375 undergraduate and graduate students at 60 institutions that participated in the survey-based Healthy Minds Study from 2012 to 2015.

Researchers assessed data from African-American, Latinx, Asian/Asian-American and Arab/Arab-American students via bivariate and multivariate modeling to determine variations across race/ethnicity. They evaluated symptom prevalence for depression, anxiety and eating disorders, non-suicidal self-injury, suicidal ideation, any mental health issue and impairment, as well as help-seeking behaviors and treatment barriers.

Read the full article about findings that college students of color have unmet mental health needs by Savannah Demko at healio.com.