By Miranda Davis
KU Statehouse Wire Service
TOPEKA ¬— The House Social Services Budget committee hearing this week centered on staff hiring and retention in the state’s mental health hospitals despite concern over individualized treatment plans for residents in the sex offenders program at Larned State Hospital.
The two state mental hospitals in Kansas would receive an additional $3 million total in their current budgets under a proposal approved by the House Appropriations committee on Thursday.
The state hospitals have come under fire in recent months after a worker was sexually assaulted at the Osawatomie hospital in October 2015. The incident led to an audit of the hospitals, and in December the Osawatomie hospital lost its federal funding after losing its Medicaid certification.
Tim Keck, secretary of the Kansas Department for Aging and Disability Services, provided an update on the audit of the Larned Hospital. There are three areas the audit wanted the hospital to focus on: realigning the program with research-based methods, addressing issues related to management and addressing population growth.
Richard D. Cagan, executive director of the Kansas chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, said he hoped the committee would discuss more than the staffing concerns. Specifically, he wanted committee members to discuss whether those in the treatment program were truly getting more individualized care and the opportunity to move through different levels, so they can eventually be reintegrated into their communities.
“This is supposed to be a treatment, a rehabilitative program,” Cagan said. “It’s not a prison.”
However, the main concern voiced at the committee meeting was staffing. Currently, the nursing staff has a 38 percent vacancy at Larned Hospital. Keck said KDADS is working with the hospitals to hire as soon as possible but didn’t offer a solution to what he said was a multifaceted problem.
“I don’t want to say money’s not the issue, because people always want to get paid more and nurses and doctors and those kinds of people deserved to get paid more,” Keck said. “But I think it’s a little more complex than that. It’s the lack of people available in the workforce, it’s the location, I suppose of the hospitals to some extent, it’s the local attitudes that exist in both of those communities.”
Cagan acknowledged the staffing issue has several causes but also said that geography is a factor in Larned’s case, citing an absence of qualified workers in the area.
Keck did not ask the committee for any financial help or adjustments from the state. He said KDADS is doing more research and continuing to meet with hospital staff to determine what changes need to happen. He said he wants to make sure he’s asking for the right things when he does eventually ask for additional funding from lawmakers.
“We need to take the time to make sure we get all of the problems and all of the issues addressed,” Keck said.