Dr. Jeff Louie

With mental health, the issue is we can acutely manage the mental health crisis with mental health assessors and whatever else we need to calm the patient down, we keep them safe. And then our mental health assessors will evaluate the child and then they'll say, okay, yeah, this patient needs to be admitted, but we have no beds.

With mental health, the issue is we can acutely manage the mental health crisis with mental health assessors and whatever else we need to calm the patient down, we keep them safe. And then our mental health assessors will evaluate the child and then they'll say, okay, yeah, this patient needs to be admitted, but we have no beds.

And now we're stuck because we don't have the resources to continually to continue the treatment of mental health in the emergency department. And that's the biggest issues.

And now we're stuck because we don't have the resources to continually to continue the treatment of mental health in the emergency department. And that's the biggest issues.

In the beginning of the influx of mental health kids, we'd have, I think it's across the board, all the hospitals, we'd have 12 kids who were unsafe to go home and they were boarding the emergency department, but they weren't getting therapy.

In the beginning of the influx of mental health kids, we'd have, I think it's across the board, all the hospitals, we'd have 12 kids who were unsafe to go home and they were boarding the emergency department, but they weren't getting therapy.

They would sit in the ED for how many days it takes to get a bed in some inpatient unit somewhere in the state of Minnesota, sometimes in Wisconsin, sometimes in the Dakotas. And, you know, five days of just us watching them, make sure they don't hurt themselves or harm other people. It puts a burden to the emergency department.

They would sit in the ED for how many days it takes to get a bed in some inpatient unit somewhere in the state of Minnesota, sometimes in Wisconsin, sometimes in the Dakotas. And, you know, five days of just us watching them, make sure they don't hurt themselves or harm other people. It puts a burden to the emergency department.

But again, we're not, we're not, we've never had training in this before.

But again, we're not, we're not, we've never had training in this before.

Yeah, and that's, so you both, thank you for bringing that up. And it comes back to my training. I was never trained to manage acute crises of mental health, in a sense, right? How to decompress these kids, how to calm them down. What medications can you use to calm them down? And then, the addiction problem really started to arise, started to increase in the prevalence of kids with mental health.

Yeah, and that's, so you both, thank you for bringing that up. And it comes back to my training. I was never trained to manage acute crises of mental health, in a sense, right? How to decompress these kids, how to calm them down. What medications can you use to calm them down? And then, the addiction problem really started to arise, started to increase in the prevalence of kids with mental health.

So we're not only dealing with kids with withdrawals from fentanyl, but a lot of mental health kids have substance abuse. And most mental health inpatient units have two separate units. There's one unit that just takes care of pure mental health issues, suicide or aggressive behavior. And then there's the suicide kids or aggressive behavior kids who are on drugs.

So we're not only dealing with kids with withdrawals from fentanyl, but a lot of mental health kids have substance abuse. And most mental health inpatient units have two separate units. There's one unit that just takes care of pure mental health issues, suicide or aggressive behavior. And then there's the suicide kids or aggressive behavior kids who are on drugs.

And the problem is, is that there's such a huge number of kids with mental health disorders who are using substances that those beds are always full. And so we'd have kids in our emergency department who have suicidal ideology, who are chronically using marijuana or chronically using alcohol. And those kids need a special unit, not just a regular unit.

And the problem is, is that there's such a huge number of kids with mental health disorders who are using substances that those beds are always full. And so we'd have kids in our emergency department who have suicidal ideology, who are chronically using marijuana or chronically using alcohol. And those kids need a special unit, not just a regular unit.

Especially, well, yeah. I mean, it comes down to there's just not enough beds in the state of Minnesota for inpatient treatment centers, right? It's a limitation of the bed space.

Especially, well, yeah. I mean, it comes down to there's just not enough beds in the state of Minnesota for inpatient treatment centers, right? It's a limitation of the bed space.

But even that, we were still having issues because the length of treatment it takes for inpatient kids, inpatient mental health unit kids who have substance abuse on top of their behavior kids, they may take longer to be at a point to go home or to go to a residential placement. And so this is backlogged still.

But even that, we were still having issues because the length of treatment it takes for inpatient kids, inpatient mental health unit kids who have substance abuse on top of their behavior kids, they may take longer to be at a point to go home or to go to a residential placement. And so this is backlogged still.