Bangor psychiatric hospital plans expansion, upgrade as needs for mental health care soar

Courtesy / Northern Light Acadia Hospital Nurses at Acadia Hospital in Bangor have filed to unionize and will vote to have their union officially recognized in the weeks to come.

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By William Hall

As Maine’s needs for mental health care reach crisis proportions, one of the state’s few psychiatric hospitals is looking to upgrade its existing facility and construct 50 new patient rooms.

Northern Light Acadia Hospital in Bangor plans to add those private rooms and also convert another 50 existing semi-private rooms to private ones, President Scott Oxley told Mainebiz on Friday.

The 29-year-old facility currently has a total of 100 inpatient beds, but can’t use all of them because of the way rooms are configured.

"The majority of our inpatient beds are semi-private rooms with two beds per room. This was a standard design for hospitals 30 years ago, but it no longer allows us to meet the community need of today," Dr. John Campbell, Acadia Hospital’s vice president and senior physician executive, said in a news release.

The care of many patients requires a private room, which makes 20 to 25 beds unavailable for use each day at the hospital, according to Campbell.

“This lack of available beds places undue strain on emergency departments which are often the only alternative for emergency psychiatric care. Psychiatric patients can sometimes spend days in emergency rooms waiting for beds,” he said.

In March 2020, the first month of the pandemic, Acadia Hospital saw a nearly 50% spike over the previous year in the number of consultations provided to 17 hospital emergency departments across Maine for crises. They included suicidal behavior or attempts, self-harm, behavioral outbursts, anxiety and substance use.

The hospital also noted that 63% of its inpatient admissions come from beyond Penobscot County.

Acadia Hospital’s medical director of community services, Dr. Anthony Ng, said in the release, "On any given day, we have 30 to 35 patients needing a psychiatric bed in these emergency rooms, half are children and adolescents. This is a challenging situation for hospital emergency rooms and patients who would benefit from admission to a psychiatric hospital without delay."

Besides Acadia Hospital, part of the Brewer-based Northern Light Health system, there are three other dedicated psychiatric hospitals in Maine: Spring Harbor Hospital, a part of the MaineHealth system, in Westbrook; the Riverview Psychiatric Center, a state facility in Augusta; and the state-operated Dorothy Dix Psychiatric Center in Bangor.

The Dix Center is licensed for 51 inpatient beds.

Plans for the build-out at Acadia Hospital are still being developed, and will require approval from the state Department of Health and Human Services. If OK'd, the project is expected to be finished next spring. No cost estimate is available yet, but the hospital told Mainebiz funding would come from a combination of internal cash reserves and philanthropic contributions.

“With the demand for inpatient psychiatric care increasing and our patients’ needs becoming more complex, now is the right time to move forward,” Oxley said in the release.

“These pressures are far from new. But the pandemic has shined a light on the urgent need for us to lead the way toward a new future of behavioral and mental health care for Maine people."