If you remember I quoted Carl Mumpower, a member of the Asheville, NC City Council, in this blog on September 21st in which he wrote these words in an op-ed piece for the Asheville Citizen-Times, “It ended with the abandonment of earlier promises and a bungled transition to a state-funded hybrid system morphing a safety net into a mineshaft.”
Being born in Eastern Kentucky in coal country I know the dangers of a mineshaft. They kill coalminers each year.
I have written before about the death here at the state hospital in Burke County were I live. This appeared Monday in the Morganton paper.
“Broughton losing millions
By Sharon McBrayer
[email protected]
Monday, September 24, 2007
Morganton - In an effort to restore $1 million a month in Medicare and Medicaid funding at Broughton Hospital, the state is stepping in.
Staff supervision and training are top priorities, said Dr. Michael Lancaster, Dempsey Benton and Mike Moseley, all with the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services.
Medicaid and Medicare funding was pulled on Aug. 25. The decision came on the heels of a patient's death on Feb. 1 and another patient's injuries on Aug. 19. “
MINESHAFTS ARE DANGEROUS PLACES TO BE GIVEN TREATMENT? You had better hope you never need them.
Actually, I am trying to be kind. A few years ago in South Florida when writing about deaths at South Florida State Hospital I called them murders. When another person sits on the chest of a person until they are dead you tell me what it is.
The folks up here are smarter than the folks in South Florida. I sat on a number of boards down there including the board of South Florida State Hospital. Maynard Taylor, a Burke County Commissioner, asked me to apply for the board of the Mental Health Services of Catawba County which now is the entity that hands out the state money for both Burke and Catawba County. They call them Local Management Entities. I did not make the board. Patty who had been the state director for PAIMI in Florida thought I would make a good member of the PAIMI advisory council here in NC. I did not make that either. So the fact is I am free to say what I want which is the way I like it as all of you who know me know.
One of the lead stories in the Asheville Citizen-Times on September 25th was about the NC Mental Health System?
“By Leslie Boyd
[email protected]
September 25, 2007 12:15 am
ASHEVILLE - In a system where the catchphrase is “no closed door,” people with mental illnesses are finding no door at all, say frustrated providers of mental health services.
Agencies are closing or losing therapists, social workers and psychologists as a crushing load of regulatory changes push costs well ahead of reimbursement rates.
Amid the tumult, people like Patrick Diraffale, who has bipolar disorder and anxiety disorder, are placed on waiting lists or told to go to an emergency room or agency that deals with patients in crisis, places that might be able to offer real help.
Diraffale was told last week he would have to wait three months for an intake appointment at a local services provider after being hospitalized for six days. He is out of medication, and has been told to use the “coping mechanisms” he was taught in the hospital.”
My question is can they find any gold down in the mineshaft? Our new Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services appointed by Gov. Easley on September 5, 2007 had been Chief Deputy Secretary from January 2001 until February 2007 at the NC Department of Environment and Natural Resources. Maybe he can find the gold!!!
My father has been dead a number of years now. He was a pastor and a teacher/principal. One of the things we discussed/argued about was his contention that a good teacher could take any textbook and teach any subject even if they did not know the subject. I said I did not believe it. Likewise, I don’t care how good a man or how good a manager Secretary Benton is I want to know what he knows about Health and Human Services. I want to know what he knows about mental health the system that has become such a mess.
Who will fix it? No one. Why? Because it will never be funded to the level that is needed and they will never come down out of their ivory towers and ask the real experts.
You can reach me directly at [email protected]
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