Mental health services face reassessment - News - Hornell Evening Tribune

BATH — Steuben County is in the middle of reassessing its health priorities for the future, as it puts together a new Community Health Improvement Plan.

The 2016-2018 plan focused on reducing childhood obesity and smoking rates and increasing access to treatment of chronic diseases. A meeting with program partners next month will measure progress and begin the formation of a new plan for 2019-2021.

A report outlining progress in 2017 is posted at the Steuben County Public Health website.

However, missing from the current community plan is expanding mental health access. Many counties named it as their top priority in their last round of plans.

Lorelei Wagner, the Steuben County Public Health Community educator, attributed its failure to appear as a top priority to a lack of public input and the delegation of responsibilities that puts mental health services under the purview of the Department of Community Services.

"For the last (plan) it was included as well, but because of the analysis, it did not rise to the top," she said. "Because we are not involved directly in the delivery of those services, in may not have been the highest priority in our plan."

Officials from the Department of Community Services were not available to comment on their comprehensive plans for the delivery of mental health services, but their website outlined the current picture of services available. 

A search of NY Connects, a state resource for connecting residents with supportive services, turned up few other results.

Many local services focus on constituent communities like drug and alcohol recovery, with few options for the general public and non-profits like ARC of Steuben provide counseling services and crisis intervention for individuals with intellectual or developmental disabilities, including autism.

Several private businesses offer counseling services as well. However, privately offered services, through inpatient hospital settings have gone by the wayside over the years in the western half of the county.

The Steuben County Community Mental Health Center provides a full range of outpatient mental health services to the residents of Steuben County. The Center operates three offices located in Bath, Corning and Hornell.

UR Medicine St. James offered no information on its website regarding psychiatric services, but employs a specialist in geriatric psychology. While the hospital does partner with Loyola Recovery to provide addiction crisis services, it closed its behavioral health unit several years ago.

As a result of the gap in comprehensive inpatient services, people needing long-term mental health commitments in Steuben County are often sent to facilities in Elmira, Warsaw and Rochester.

Mental Health Clinician Wendy Pinder, who provides assessment of people who walk into the Emergency Room in crisis, said, "Nobody has enough services. It's difficult, because people come into the ER in crisis, and expect to be treated right then and there."

Patients she's assessed have been transferred to facilities as far away as Syracuse and Cooperstown, with others ending up in Elmira, Olean, Warsaw, Penn Yan, Rochester and Buffalo, among others, as no other hospitals in Steuben County are capable of facilitating long-term holds or commitments, Pinder said.

Despite the availability of stop-gap measures, like mental health crisis hotlines for each county in New York state and outpatient services for targeted communities, Pinder hopes that the issue ends up on the radar of local, state and federal officials,

"Facilities are few and far between," she said, but realized that facilities can be "time consuming and costly" for under-supported hospitals to provide alone.

However, Public Health officials anticipate that they will receive input on mental health access as they formulate their new Community Health Improvement Plan. They will rely on over 500 responses, more than a dozen focus groups, discussions with community organizations involved in health and internal review.

"In our questionnaire that went out, mental health is an area that was looked at. In our focus groups, it's something that has been discussed as well," health educator Wagner said. "For this plan, it may rise to the top."

Like priorities identified for the 2016-2018 plan, if mental health is identified in the next Community Health Improvement Plan, the Department of Public Health will work with schools, hospitals and private providers to institute plans to improve access to services.

To give input on the formulation of the upcoming plan, contact the Department of Public Health on their Facebook fan page, or call 607-664-2438.

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