A new 10-bed hospital unit specifically for youth with mental health and substance abuse problems will open next year at North Vancouver’s HOpe Centre at Lions Gate Hospital.
Health Minister Terry Lake made the announcement at the HOpe Centre Wednesday morning.
The new unit, which will be built in empty space on the third floor of the HOpe Centre, will focus on psychiatric assessment and stabilization of youth aged 13 to 18 during short hospital stays of two to three weeks.
The centre will have private bedrooms as well as access to a gym, lounge, kitchen, areas where families can spend time with their children, as well as treatment areas.
The centre will have a higher ratio of staff to patients than an adult unit and will provide for teens to be able to continue their school work while receiving treatment.
The Lions Gate Hospital Foundation has committed to raise the approximately $5-million capital cost of the project, launched Wednesday with recognition of a $2-million donation towards the new centre by West Vancouver philanthropists Jack and Leone Carlile.
The province will pay $3.1 million in annual operating costs of the centre through Vancouver Coastal Health, said Lake.
Construction is expected to begin in August and the new centre is scheduled to open in the spring of 2017.
Judy Savage, president of the Lions Gate Hospital Foundation, said the foundation is “absolutely delighted” with the Carliles’ donation, which launched the funding campaign for the new unit.
The foundation is now on a tight timeline to raise approximately $3 million more needed to fund construction, she said, but is committed to that goal.
In announcing the new centre, Lake said mental health issues touch people from all walks of life. “We all know friends, neighbours, family members who have issues,” he said. When a child or teen has mental health problems, “the world is turned upside down” for the entire family, he said.
Lake said one in five visits to St. Paul’s Hospital emergency room in downtown Vancouver for mental health or substance abuse problems is made by youth under the age of 24.
He added early intervention is key in mental health cases and the new centre will provide a safe and welcoming environment for families to seek help.
Diane Mazzei, a North Vancouver mother whose own son developed mental illness as a teen, said that’s key for families who are often overwhelmed and don’t know where to turn for help.
In her own case, mental health problems were “one of those unfortunate events that happened to other people” until her son, a student at Handsworth secondary, started becoming a stranger to her.
“We were confused and in shock,” she said, adding her son’s mental illness sent the family into crisis before they found help and the situation began to stabilize.
Now representing the North Shore Family Advisory Committee for Mental Health and Addictions, Mazzei helps other families access resources at the HOpe Centre and prepare for the long journey toward recovery that often follows a diagnosis of mental illness.
“You think it’s going to be a short solution. … We’ll put him on some meds and he’ll come home and everything will be fixed. But it doesn’t work that way,” she said.
Lake said the public often doesn’t see the kinds of support available for mental health patients, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.
“It is not like taking an X-ray or doing a CT scan or doing a blood test,” he said. “These are challenging problems.”
The province spends $1.4 billion each year on mental health and substance abuse, he said, including funding a number of specialized community treatment teams.
The province has also recently announced plans for a new 105-bed mental health facility on the grounds of Riverview Hospital in Coquitlam, plus plans for a new 100-bed mental health centre at Vancouver General Hospital and a 75-bed mental health and substance abuse facility at the Royal Columbian Hospital in New Westminster.
The $62-million HOpe Centre in North Vancouver, also dedicated to treatment of mental health and addictions, opened in 2014.
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