Mental Health Care Capacity on the Rebound for Arizonans
One year after the officially declared end of the COVID-19 pandemic in the U.S., caregivers are patiently restoring the service capacities that the epidemic robbed from their communities.
Valleywise Behavioral Health Center in Phoenix, Ariz. is among the latest examples. After COVID-related staffing shortages forced it to cut back on psychiatric services, the network is working to replenish its mental health care capacity by reopening 15 inpatient beds.
Valleywise Health, renamed from Maricopa Integrated Health System in 2019, is the Phoenix area’s safety net health care system and Arizona’s largest provider of court-ordered inpatient behavioral health care. The restoration of even a modest number of beds nonetheless makes a difference, according to health system leaders.
Further steps include the planned restoration of three wings located in west Phoenix’s Maryvale neighborhood that were forced to close in 2022 due to a shortage of mental health professionals.
To make that happen, Valleywise Health has been training new psychiatrists, while aggressively recruiting and hiring psychiatric nurses, technicians and other staff members.
If all goes according to plan the shuttered units will reopen over the next 12-18 months to once again serve the citizens of Phoenix.