New health unit puts help where it’s needed most
Innovation on addictions, mental health, say Adam Palmer and Bill MacEwan.
A new, innovative, health-care facility is under construction and slated to open this spring at St. Paul’s Hospital in Vancouver. It will have a positive impact on the lives of people with mental-health and substance-use challenges.
And it shows how business, police, public health care and different levels of government can quickly mobilize to make a difference.
The facility is called HUB. It’s the first of its kind in Western Canada. The $3.5-million centre, which consists of two re-deployable, sophisticated units next to St. Paul’s Emergency Department, combines emergency care, rapid-access treatment and transition services for patients with mental-health and/or substance-use challenges.
HUB came together after the Vancouver Police Foundation received $750,000 from an anonymous donor in 2015. The donor requested that the money be used to help alleviate the mental-health and addiction crisis in the city. The Vancouver Police Department approached St. Paul’s Hospital and the idea of a transitional centre, designed to help discharged patients move back to their communities and to proper care, was born. The idea became a reality when other partners — the B.C. Ministry of Health, Providence Health Care, the St. Paul’s Foundation, PHC Office of Innovation and Strategic Partnerships, Vancouver Coastal Health, the City of Vancouver, Weatherhaven Global Resources Ltd. — all came on board.
HUB was designed specifically to better serve Vancouver’s most vulnerable patients. However, it will also improve the effectiveness of the service provided by first responders and healthcare professionals.
On the policing side, it will decrease the amount of time officers wait with patients. When VPD officers escort a patient to St. Paul’s Emergency, they wait with the patient until a doctor can see them, on average 75 minutes. HUB is expected to reduce this wait time per patient to 20 minutes.
On the health-care side, patients will be served more efficiently by being connected with the specific care they require. St. Paul’s Emergency sees more than 10,500 patients with mental-health and substance-use issues each year — the highest number of any ER in the province. HUB will triage about 6,000 of these patients out of the typical ER flow.
Further, health-care providers at HUB can focus solely on their patients and provide culturally appropriate, trauma-informed care in a dignified, private setting, away from the busyness of a downtown ER. The innovative transition centre will include overnight accommodation with bathrooms and showers, and a common lounge and kitchen area. Most importantly, it will help connect people with primary health care, specialist care and community agencies in their neighbourhoods.
With the new model, doctors, nurses and other staff such as social workers can team up to ensure the best, most integrated care possible. A key part of this care is the service that will be provided by specialized addictions nurses and physicians to treat those dependent on a variety of substances, including opioids. This will ensure patients have access to treatments like replacement therapy, such as Suboxone or methadone, as quickly as possible.
Mental health and substance use are complex, deep-rooted issues for our city. For years, first responders and community and health partners have worked together to find solutions and help those in need. Yet the issues persist. We are now in the midst of a major publichealth crisis, with people dying daily in our city from illicit drug overdoses. We know that some people with substance-use issues also dealt with mental-health challenges. Now, more than ever, we need innovative solutions, like HUB, where key partners come together to help some of the most vulnerable people in Vancouver.
This will ensure patients have access to treatments ... as quickly as possible.