Ramsey D

Review of The Horsham Clinic

I appreciate that taking care of adolescent childr...

I appreciate that taking care of adolescent children is difficult task and that worried parents probably never get all the information they want. I also appreciate that mental illness is not easy to treat. I certainly appreciate that mental health is under funded, under regulated, under insured and understaffed as a whole. But all these considerations do not give a free pass to Horsham Clinic (or any other provider of health care) in their responsibilities as human beings. The lack of communication by the staff at Horsham is mind bending. They take your child, and maybe you'll get a phone call once in a week by a psychiatrist. We found that the psychiatrist who called us was extremely poor in communicating to us even when she did call. We found that if we wanted to reach her, that days might pass before we would get a return call. It certainly felt that the psychiatrist was only calling because there was an obligation to call anytime there was a change in medication plan. But there really was no update on our child beyond that. The time the psychiatrist spent with our child is minimal (according to our child, who admittedly might be biased in their reporting). The therapist, a LCSW, was pleasant and tried to schedule weekly family meetings. These meetings were not helpful. I found the therapist not particularly up to date with our child's history. I was not even sure the purpose of the family meeting. It was not for family therapy. It was not for them to give us recommendations. The therapist would say "so has dr. X suggested a date of discharge to you?" or... "where do you think your child should go after leaving here?" From my perspective, those are answers they should be providing to us. The times we could call our child was 12-1 or 6-9 every day. Calling into the clinic is TORTURE. You first call the main number - that takes usually 2-3 minutes to get to a human. Then they transfer you to the unit. The phone often rings for 2-5 minutes. Then you get someone on the phone that leaves you hangin a moment just to tell you all the lines are busy. They only have two phones for 30 kids. They might tell you that they will have your child call back, but that never happens. So the only report really I have of what is going on is from our mentally stressed and ill child - that i can sometimes get on the phone for a few minutes a day. All therapy is group therapy. There is no individual therapy (I'm guess the main reason is that there is not enough resources). My child complains about the food - hot pockets are the best. fish sticks are soggy, etc. Of course, that can be a 14yo just complaining. There is also the feeling that kids can easily go into the clinic to hid from reality and develop a peer relationship with like-minded depressed or outcast kids. This has the potential to be a positive feedback loop for either returning to the clinic or normalizing unhealthy behaviors. While there is group therapy, there is also just a lot of monitoring to prevent self harm. Mental health crises do not get fixed overnight. Do not send your kid here to think they will come up with their head on straight. The entire point is just so they can be watched. While they require a plan after discharge, that is easier said than one. I am lucky to have resources, but it was still difficult to find an outpatient therapist. Partial hospitalization at Horsham also was not anything amazing. There was group therapy and babysitting. Of course, the costs are incredible. Luckily my insurance covered everything (so far as I know). Every two weeks my insurance was billed about $30K and there was an $18K deduction. Multiple that out by 30 kids...they make quite a bit of money. I do not understand why they are not interested in communicating with parents better. If my child was in the hospital i would get daily updates from physicians (and often more than daily). And I could ask a nurse for an update at anytime. It is a very strange feeling to drop your kid off at a "hospital" and then not see them for weeks potentially with minimal updates.