By Kristin Rover
Sun staff
After $3.5 million in renovations, the re-designed behavioral health facility at Mercy Health-Clermont Hospital is open for patients.
An open house was held June 18 to showcase the new facility, and officials with Mercy Health and Catholic Health Partners, an organization that oversees 24 hospitals in Ohio, including Mercy Clermont, were on hand to discuss the re-design.
“It is absolutely phenomenal that we have been able to do this and realize this vision,” Dr. Donna Markham, president of Behavioral Health Institute for Catholic Health Partners, said.
Markham said the goal was to re-design the 18,000 square foot facility in a way that was safe for the patients, but also provided a therapeutic environment.
“We wanted to make it beautiful and safe, and that’s a challenge,” she said.
Dr. Navdeep Kang, market director for programs excellence, Southwest Ohio Behavioral Health Institute at Mercy Health, said the theme is a beautiful environment that helps patients get better.
Kang said calming and soothing room colors and themes were researched and selected for the facility.
“Everything was designed with safety and down regulation of emotional intensity,” Kang said.
The re-design includes upgraded patient rooms as well as common areas and group meeting rooms for patients.
Services at the behavioral facility include acute care, partial hospitalization, and intensive outpatient programs. The unit also has exercise equipment for patients.
Kang said he is pleased with the re-design.
“It is fantastic,” Kang said. “It’s very exciting and I am looking forward to the work we will be doing here.”
Michael Connelly, president and CEO of Catholic Health Partners, said he traveled to different behavioral health units throughout Ohio and found that the environment in many of the facilities was depressing.
“There was an obsession with safety but not a focus on therapy,” Connelly said.
He said Mercy Regional Medical Center in Loraine, Ohio was the first hospital in the system to re-design the behavioral health facility.
“That became the inspiration of what could be,” Connelly said.
He said the re-design at Mercy Health-Clermont Hospital is just the beginning for improving behavioral health facilities throughout the Catholic Health Partners network.
Dr. Larry Graham, medical director for Mercy Health-Clermont Hospital Behavioral Health Facility, has been at the hospital for 21 years and said the new unit is much different and improved from the old one.
“Patients coming in are surprised by the environment and light,” Graham said. “The physical environment affects everybody in a certain way. Now that the environment is different it gives us a lot more options.”