Leading Stories, Articles
Mindful Teen program a ‘hub of care’ for adolescents
By Phyllis Hanlon
In 2012, Bradley Hospital launched its Mindful Teen program, which teaches teens the skills needed to manage a myriad of psychological challenges. Two years later, the program moved to a stricter, full dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) model and in 2016, the program became a hub for care. Kerri Kim, Ph.D., program manager for the Mindful Teen program, explained that staff underwent intensive training before implementing the existing Mindful Teen model. She noted that an increase in the number of teens admitted to the inpatient units at Bradley and other area hospitals provided the impetus to enhance the program. Some teens [More]
Tags: teens, Bradley Hospital, Mindful Teen program, skills, psychological challenges, family skills, group therapy, individual therapy, Kerri Kim Ph.D.
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VT braces for loss of psychiatric bed Medicaid funding
By Janine Weisman
A special waiver exempts Vermont from a decades-old restriction prohibiting states from using Medicaid funds to cover services for non-elderly adults with mental health conditions in hospital settings with more than 16 beds. But Vermont’s waiver is set to expire starting in 2021 and phase out completely in 2025. That would leave the state on the hook for the $23 million in federal dollars being used to provide treatment for patients ages 21 to 64 at the Vermont Psychiatric Care Hospital (VPCH) in Berlin and Brattleboro Retreat, said Department of Mental Health (DMH) Commissioner Melissa Bailey. A proposal among an [More]
Tags: mental health system, Mental health, Vermont, Brattleboro Retreat, exemption, Medicaid, hospitals, increase bed capacity
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Marketing is key to building practice but must be done with careful planning
By Catherine Robertson Souter
In today’s competitive world where everything from the pens floating around at the bottom of a laptop bag to the mugs sitting on the kitchen counter has a brand on it, most businesses prioritize a marketing plan. If a psychological practice is also a business, with rent to pay, staff to hire, and a “product” to sell, does it follow that psychologists should also consider instituting a marketing plan? The answer is, yes, but also…within certain parameters and with careful planning. There has long been some hesitation within mental health towards marketing, with the idea that, in order to “sell [More]
Tags: professionals, business, marketing plan, community, networking, local groups, writing articles, relationship building, therapy practice, strategy
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Revenue to focus on increasing inpatient capacity
By Pamela Berard
The Green Mountain Care Board (GMCB) gave the go-ahead for the University of Vermont (UVM) Health Network to move forward on a project that would use the Network’s extra revenue from 2017 to increase inpatient mental health capacity in Vermont. The GMCB, established by the Vermont Legislature in 2011, is charged with reducing the rate of health care cost growth in Vermont while ensuring the state maintains a high-quality, accessible health care system. Vermont’s hospital budgets are regulated by the GMCB. When health care facilities exceed allowable budgeted net patient revenues, they are subject to review and possible regulatory action, [More]
Tags: children, adolescents, Mental health, Vermont, emergency room, inpatient, Medicaid, mental health crisis, psychiatric beds
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Maine Gov. LePage continues push for step-down unit in Bangor
By Janine Weisman
Republican Maine Gov. Paul LePage’s effort to build a privately run 21-bed stepdown unit for Augusta’s Riverview Psychiatric Center on state land in Bangor has quietly resumed with a developer’s permit application filed with the Bangor Planning Board. Bangor Holdings LLC in Hermon submitted an application and site development plan on May 30 to build a one-story, 9,536 square foot secure forensic rehabilitation facility on State Hospital Drive on the grounds of the Dorothea Dix Psychiatric Center. Although the application sought a site review, Bangor Planning Officer David Gould said the proposed 2.32-acre site would need a conditional use permit [More]
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Brattleboro Retreat expands telepsychiatry services
By Pamela Berard
Following the successful launch of a pilot inpatient telepsychiatry program, the Brattleboro Retreat in Vermont has expanded its telepsychiatry services. In early 2017, a psychiatrist on the medical staff at the Retreat — a not-for-profit specialty psychiatric and addiction treatment hospital — moved out of state but wanted to stay involved. Brattleboro Retreat developed an inpatient model of telepsychiatry for the staffer to provide remote, real-time video consultation with patients. “It was very well received early on by patients as well as our staff and the physician involved,” said Mark McGee, M.D., chief medical officer. The Retreat has since hired [More]
Tags: telepsychiatry, Brattleboro Retreat, video consultation, remote consultation, psychiatric services, patient, staff, communication
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Mass. increases beds, facilities while other states remain stable
By Phyllis Hanlon
The psychiatric care landscape has shifted in recent years from an inpatient setting to community placement and back to in-hospital treatment. New England Psychologist surveyed the New England states to assess the current inpatient situation. Kathleen Remillard, public information officer (PIO) at New Hampshire’s Department of Health and Human Services, reported that the state has had no psychiatric unit closures in the past year. Rather, New Hampshire has gained 20 new transitional housing beds for patients recently released from New Hampshire Hospital or other designated receiving facilities. Vermont has also added 20 youth psychiatric beds; and four mobile crisis apartments [More]
Tags: New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, psychiatric care, increase in beds, increase in facilities, opioid crisis, behavioral health, Connecticut, psychiatric unit
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Psychologists weigh benefits, challenges of working in inpatient hospital settings
By Phyllis Hanlon
Psychologists today have opportunities to pursue several different professional career paths. New England Psychologist spoke to psychologists who practice in inpatient settings and found that this venue offers both rewards and challenges. Before retiring, Robert J. Kamman, Ph.D, of Raymond, Maine, spent 32 years working at the Buffalo Psychiatric Center in New York, where he conducted initial screenings on every admission and determined the necessity for assessments. His responsibilities also included administering tests, running group therapy sessions, collaborating with the art and music therapist, occasionally treating patients on an individual basis and frequently working with families. Throughout his career, the [More]
Tags: psychologist, mental illness, hospital, administering tests, group therapy sessions, inpatient, aggressive behavior, suicidal tendencies, burnout
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Vermont searches for solutions to increase bed capacity
By Janine Weisman
The Vermont House of Representatives Committee on Health Care has already come out against funding a temporary 12-bed forensic unit at the Northwest State Correctional Facility in Gov. Phil Scott’s proposed fiscal 2019 state budget. But during the appropriation process in early April, Senate members appeared more receptive toward the facility proposed to alleviate the demand on emergency rooms and psychiatric facilities around the state. “That’s a showdown between the Senate and the House that we get caught in the middle of,” said Department of Mental Health (DMH) Commissioner Melissa Bailey. “They’ve got to figure out where they’re going to [More]
Tags: Mental health, Vermont, Department of Mental Health, psychiatric care, inpatient, bed capacity, Green Mountain Care Board, psychiatric facilities
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Plymouth’s Child and Family Services re-design creates stir
By Susan Gonsalves
Earlier this year, there was an outcry when word got out that the Emergency Services Program (ESP) operated by Child and Family Services in Plymouth was about to change. Executive Director Anne Sampaio, LICSW, noted that people feared the closure of the current office space on Long Pond Road in June would mean that people in 10 communities would be left without `walk-in’ aid or have to travel to the New Bedford site for help. The program provides crisis intervention for a variety of mental health and substance use disorders. The services include facilitating a placement in a treatment facility, [More]
Tags: Mental health, Massachusetts, Child and Family Services, Plymouth, New Bedford, Duxbury, Halifax, Hanover, Hanson, Kingston, Marshfield, Pembroke, Plympton, mergency Services Program, crisis intervention, substance use disorders
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