Milwaukee's Mental Health Emergency Center
Milwaukee County has announced a new facility that is designed to provide short-term mental health care, and serve as a transition for long-term needs. It will be available to all county residents regardless of their ability to pay.
According to a fact sheet distributed at the announcement event, 93% of psychiatric patients admitted to crisis center in Wauwatosa originate from the City of Milwaukee, with 70% of those patients living in close proximity to the center’s planned location.
“We are committed to ensuring that Wisconsin workers, families, and communities are not only bouncing back from this pandemic financially, but that we are addressing the increased need for mental and behavioral healthcare and building healthy communities well into the future,” said Governor Evers. “This facility will play a critical role in strengthening our mental healthcare infrastructure by expanding access to treatment and providing a wide range of options for people experiencing mental health crises to get the care they need.”
The efforts to create a safe, welcoming, and helpful environment is a joint venture between Milwaukee County, Advocate Aurora Health, Ascension Wisconsin, Children’s Wisconsin, and Froedtert Health. The new Mental Health Emergency Center is the next major milestone in Milwaukee's journey toward holistic, decriminalized, de-stigmatized and equitable mental health care.
The new Mental Health Emergency Center will be located at 1525 N. 12th St in the City of Milwaukee and is scheduled to open in the spring of 2022.
MHEC's Services
24/7 crisis mental health services for children, adolescents and adults. Targeted to open in early 2022, the MHEC will offer 24/7 crisis mental health assessment, stabilization, treatment and transition care management for children, adolescents and adults. There will be a separate treatment area for child and adolescent patients, as well as a separate entrance for those arriving via law enforcement.
The MHEC will provide a therapeutic environment for both voluntary and involuntary patients and facilitate the timely transfer for those under law enforcement custody to the care of highly trained, compassionate mental health professionals.
The anticipated length of stay for emergency care is 4 to 23 hours with the goal for all patients to receive timely treatment and transfer to the appropriate level of care. The MHEC will have two adult observation and four short-stay adult inpatient beds. Children and adolescents needing observation or inpatient services will be promptly transferred to a pediatric mental health facility.
Extensive care management and navigation services will be provided by the MHEC, ensuring safe and timely connections to continuing care - be that extended inpatient, residential or outpatient mental services or medications, housing, food and other social supports.
Crisis telepsychiatry services will be available to patients being served in other health care settings, as well.
Children's Wisconsin Opens Mental Health Walk-in Clinic
A new mental health walk-in clinic for children is set to open soon at Children's Wisconsin.
The clinic, which is the first of its kind for children in the Milwaukee area, will serve as a tool for children experiencing urgent mental and behavioral health needs.
Amy Herbst, Vice President of mental and behavioral health at Children's Wisconsin announced, "It really came from families telling us that they needed a place to go for immediate mental health care."
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, 1 in 5 children was living with mental illness in Wisconsin. Since the pandemic began, visits to Children’s Wisconsin emergency department for mental behavioral health concerns have increased by 40%, Herbst said.
"We knew, before the pandemic, that our kids were in the midst of a mental health crisis," Herbst mentioned. "Then the pandemic only really exasperated that issue."
Previously, children who were experiencing urgent mental health issues would be directed to an emergency room. The hospital came to the conclusion that they needed to create a clinic where families could walk in for immediate mental health care needs, which could include brief interventions, safety risk assessments and navigation for continued ongoing care that children might need. Now, children will be directed to the clinic, named The Craig Yabuki Mental Health Walk-In Clinic.
The new clinic is named after Craig Yabuki, who died by suicide in 2017. He left behind a wife and three children. His brother, Jeff Yabuki, gave $20 million to fund the addition of therapists to every Children’s primary care and urgent care office in southeastern Wisconsin.
The clinic is within the Clinics Bing at the hospital, at the Milwaukee Regional Medical Center in Wauwatosa, 8700 W. Watertown Plank Road and plans on opening in February of 2022.