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Vermont awards
five new crisis beds
(December
2007 Issue)
By Elinor Nelson
Vermont currently has a total of 22 psychiatric crisis beds, which
even for a small state of 600,000 people, is inadequate. Realizing
that their single state hospital - licensed for 54 beds - was antiquated
and that "only a handful of other hospitals around Vermont were
designated to provide mental health care," the Department of Mental
Health a few years ago embarked on an intense planning process to
"find a better mix of services as alternatives to the state hospital,"
explains Vermont's Mental Health Systems Development Director Dawn
Philibert, MSW.
The state issued a Request for Proposals in July and in October
awarded $541,000 for fiscal 2008 for five new crisis beds. "Our
purpose is to divert from inpatient psychiatric hospital care and
create settings in the community where people who need support and
supervision can have it in the local community, rather than go to
the state hospital," Philibert says.
Vermont is seeking to "approve beds in areas where there could
be a significant impact on psychiatric admissions or length of stay,"
says Philibert. The state therefore granted two beds to Rutland
Mental Health Services in Rutland - which had no crisis beds and
is the second largest city in Vermont - and three beds to Howard
Center in Burlington, which already has three beds. The Burlington
area is a "heavy user" of the state hospital and it is thought that
the crisis beds will divert some patients.
A state report from October 2006 states a desire to eventually
replace the state hospital with a "new array of inpatient, rehabilitation
and support services for adults." One of the goals of the transformed
mental health system, the report says, would be to reduce inpatient
admissions by creating a "well-coordinated emergency system." The
new crisis beds are meant to provide crisis stabilization, hospital
step-down and "care of public inebriates."
"Crisis beds support the goals of safety, stabilization and recovery,"
the 2006 state report elaborates. "They serve as alternatives to
days spent in psychiatric inpatient settings. They are clinically
appropriate, preferable to the consumer and cost effective."
A high priority of this process is to make psychiatric emergency
care available to most Vermonters in or near their own communities.
With these new beds, services will be available in Burlington, Rutland,
Bennington, Barre, Springfield, Northeast Kingdom and St. Albans.
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