Mental Health Resource Shortage Creates Crisis for Emergency Departments

By marti WeBB Slay

The shortage of resources for mental health patients is resulting in a problem for hospital emergency departments, which are seeing an increasing number of psychiatric patients.

“It’s a daily struggle,” said Elizabeth Caine, MSHA, MBA, associate vice president and administrator for UAB’s Center for Psychiatric Medicine. “It causes a backlog for patients seeking medical care and trauma care.”

By June 30, UAB had boarded psychiatric patients in the emergency de- partment for more than 2,600 hours per month, on average. “We are delivering

(CONTINUED ON PAGE 4) (CONTINUED ON care, but it takes up space and prevents the emergency department from turning the beds over and seeing other patients who come in,” Caine said.

The problem of emergency department backlog isn’t unique to psychiatric patients. “Almost every emergency department in our state deals with boarding crises on a daily basis,” said Jeremy Rogers, MD, FACEP, associate medical director of the department of emergency medicine at Grandview Medical Center. “Many days, our Alabama hospitals have prolonged wait times when there are no inpatient beds available. This is not just a psychiatric care issue. It is a general situa-