>NJ hospital responds to growing psychiatric needs to geriatric patients
A New Jersey hospital has responded to growing psychiatric needs of geriatric patients by adding 22 beds at Clara Maass Medical Center, a new unit that was nearly filled before its official opening.
Area psychiatrists and long-term care facility directors began sending patients “just because they heard about us on the vine,” said Joe Hicks, executive director of the Behavioral Health Network of Barnabas Health, parent of Clara Maass in Belleville. “The need is really significant.”
Hicks and other health experts predict the need to continue increasing as the population ages. They are also closely watching the potential impact of the June 30 closure of the state’s Hagedorn Psychiatric Hospital in Glen Gardner, Hunterdon County, which specializes in gero-psychiatry. (Fitzgerald, NJ Spotlight)