News
NOAH Faces Closure:
Not Funded in Proposed Budget
Governor Bobby Jindal recently released his state budget for 2009-10. As a cost cutting measure, the governor proposes closing NOAH and consolidating inpatient mental health services with Southeast Louisiana Hospital in Mandeville.
We believe this plan will be detrimental to the health and well being of the people of New Orleans and the surrounding communities.
NOAH provides a JCAHO coordinated continuum of care for children and adolescents unlike any other facility in Louisiana. In addition, NOAH met the mental health needs of the public after Katrina, by opening greatly needed adult inpatient beds.
NOAH needs to remain in the city of New Orleans for obvious reasons:
- The people of New Orleans and the surrounding metropolitan area of Jefferson, St. Bernard and Plaquemines Parishes make up an average of 75.3% of the patients treated at NOAH. They deserve to have a mental health care facility that meets their needs located in the area in which they live.
- New Orleans has a high number of inner-city poor children, teens and adults with severe mental illness.
- Many of the patients’ family members who visit and attend family therapy sessions travel by public transportation – there is no affordable or convenient public transportation to the Northshore.
- NOAH provides 24-hour crisis intervention services for children and adolescents because of its location in the Greater New Orleans area.
The Department of Health and Hospitals states that NOAH costs twice as much to operate than Southeast Louisiana Hospital or other state run facilities. But what they fail to mention is that comparing Southeast to NOAH is like comparing apples to oranges. In addition to the hospital inpatient units, NOAH’s budget includes community services such as the Crisis Intervention Service, the Child Adolescent Response Team (CART), the Assertive Community Treatment (ACT) program, the Algiers Clinic, Chartres-Pontchartrain Clinic, and Central City Clinic and the mobile clinic that travels to St. Bernard to provide mental health services.
NOAH is an acute-care facility with an average 21-day length of stay. Southeast is a long-term care facility. Operating costs for a hospital like NOAH, with high acuity levels and a rapid turnover of patients, are greater. Also, NOAH is the primary training facility for LSU general psychiatry trainees and child/adolescent psychiatry residents. NOAH trains social workers, psychologists, occupational therapists, nurses (RN and LPN’s) and pharmacy students.
In addition, DHH has, over the years, repeatedly closed inpatient beds at NOAH (most recently in February with the closure of a 15 bed adult unit) driving up the per diem cost of treatment.
NOAH is a “safety net” facility that often compensates for missing parts in the overall continuum of care. Due to this reality, NOAH cares for the patient who is difficult to discharge and children and adolescents in need of scarce placements. NOAH will admit patients that other private facilities won’t take, especially forensic, autistic and severely acting out cases (for instance fire-setters and sexual predators).
We need your help to ensure that the New Orleans area children, teens and adults with severe mental illness can continue to receive treatment at NOAH.
It’s not too late. There’s still time for NOAH.
Please call or e-mail Governor Bobby Jindal today!
Click Here!
Toll free 866-366-1121 or 225-342-7015
Community Shares Resources
at Fair Under the Oaks
Under a brilliant blue sky, health care and mental health resource providers networked with each other and consumers at the Fair Under the Oaks held at NOAH in March. The Fair’s theme was “Rebuilding New Orleans, Restoring Mental Health”. Healthcare agencies and other providers shared information about their programs while enjoying entertainment, food and prizes.
