Savannah's mental health hospital to remain open

The new director of a new state agency for mental health is wasting no time making his mark on the state's mental health system. Governor Sonny Perdue appointed Doctor Frank Shelp to head the new Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities eight days ago. And today we learn that Shelp is reversing an unpopular decision to close a mental health hospital in Savannah

The decision last year to close Georgia Regional Hospital caused an uproar among local officials, who denouced the plan as a recipe for disaster. The plan would have left South Georgia without any place nearby to take the most seriously mentally ill patients. But that plan was made by the state Department of Human Resources. There's a new agency over mental health now, headed by Doctor Frank Shelp.

"I would say that it is a new course correction of about 35 to 40 degrees," says Shelp.

Shelp doesn't characterize the move to keep Georgia Regional open as a complete reversal because his vision for mental health keeps in place many aspects of D-H-R's proposal, known as "the game plan."

"The discussion became around closing a hospital or leaving a hospital open," says Shelp. "And that discussion reached such a level that it really precluded discussing other aspects of the game plan."

Shelp says, the plan was always to increase the continuum of care, such as with crisis stabilization programs, or C.S.P.'s, that promise more local services for most mentally ill patients, while none for the most seriously ill. Shelp says, a few patients might still be moved to the state's main mental health facility Milledgeville, but "the goal right now is to come up with a modification that will manage 95% plus of patient needs in their own region."

Shelp says, he's still developing plans for what to do with patients referred to the mental health system from the criminal justice system. He says, that part of the "game plan" was never fully explained. And just hearing that pleases advocates for the mentally ill. June Dipolito runs the Pineland mental health agency in Statesboro.

"I am excited beyond words," Dipolito says. "You cannot really run community mental health services without having the deep and intensive services of the acute psychiatric beds."

The new Commissioner of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities currently works at Georgia Regional in Savannah. Frank Shelp is set to move to Atlanta by July.

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