Keeping doors open
Sunday, September 30th, 2007
By Chris Fitzsimon
State can’t afford another mental health reform fiasco
If we’ve learned anything from the six-year effort to reform North Carolina’s mental health system, it’s how dangerous it is to stop providing some services without making sure new programs that replace them are not just available, but working right as well.
The same thing goes for adequate facilities. That’s why the state would be wise to keep the doors open at Dorothea Dix hospital in Raleigh after the new Central Regional Hospital opens in Butner next year. The sad story of the state’s mental health reform efforts has centered on the inability of existing mental health hospitals to serve many patients for longer than a brief stay.
The new hospital, which is intended to replace both Dix and John Umstead hospital in Butner, is supposed to have adequate space for current daily demand of more than 500. It also will have access to a patient overflow facility operating on the Umstead campus that can handle 117 patients. But state legislators are wise to make sure the new hospital can handle the patient load before it opens and the old hospitals close. (more…)
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