Court proceedings delay reopening of behavioral health unit in Jackson

JACKSON, Miss. (WLBT) – The St. Dominic Behavioral Health unit closed in June 2023. And despite plans for it to reopen with different ownership, a lawsuit is delaying that.

Texas-based Oceans Behavioral Health had applied to lease the unit as a separately licensed psychiatric hospital. According to filed documents, Ocean’s plan is to offer acute adult psychiatric services using the existing 77 inpatient beds formerly offered by St. Dominic.

Now, Merit Health is suing Oceans Behavioral Health and St. Dominic. They argue that they aren’t following the proper procedures to re-open the behavioral health beds and they believe the route they’re taking will place more burden on them.

Julie Whitehead was a patient at St. Dominic Behavioral Health on more than one occasion and explained what it’s been like since the unit closed.

“I have been on a tightrope, personally, ever since the unit shut down,” said Whitehead. “There have been times when I thought ‘I want to get to a unit to help me.’ But I can’t because they reported, after the first interview we did with you, that Merit Health was at 100% capacity and would probably stay that way. So, I white-knuckled it through it. “

Now, that she is learning the delay in re-opening is because of court proceedings, she’s upset.

“To me, it’s very, absolutely infuriating to see human lives kicked around like a football,” she added. “And that’s what this is.”

In court filings, Merit Health says Oceans needs to go through a new Certificate of Need process because it’s not reopening the beds with the same format. It appears a Certificate of Need review was done in December by the Department of Health. That review noted that Oceans intends to have 2% of its care devoted to indigent and charity care. But MSDH suggested 17% would instead be a reasonable amount and comparable to the amount offered by surrounding providers.

Yet, the Change of Ownership paperwork was submitted in February and approved by the Department of Health in March.

Merit claims in filings that’s allowed for a workaround on the original suggestion that the facility wouldn’t be providing enough indigent care and they say more of that financial burden will shift to them.

Oceans Healthcare provided the following statement.

Like most states, Mississippi’s mental health care system has been in a state of crisis for several years. That crisis is particularly acute in Jackson, where patients in need of mental health support are too often forced to seek care in less-than-ideal settings like an emergency room or the jail system.

We have followed the process as established by the Mississippi State Department of Health and stand ready to help address that need.

We are committed to reopening the hospital on North Curran Drive, to employing the caregivers and support team needed for its operation, and to delivering the services that are so desperately needed in the community.

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