Mental health: Hospital troubles revive bad memories
Re: “Psychiatric hospital turned man away before his suicide,” (TNT, 8/10).
It is deja vu all over again with the new psychiatric hospital’s accreditation issues. Pierce County had the same problem when it bought the old Pierce County Hospital. By the time it got the accreditation, the county was millions of dollars in financial overages, and never recovered.
I realize the new hospital has many more beds, but only a fraction are filled and they over cripplingly overstaffed. How many mental health dollars will it take to make them whole when they finally get accredited?
In the meantime, we have clients in residential settings who need to be hospitalized now but are unable to get care!
Gerald Pratt, Puyallup
(Pratt is owner of Puyallup Valley Enhanced Residential Care Inc.)
This story was originally published August 15, 2019 at 2:54 PM.