Fornits
Treatment Abuse, Behavior Modification, Thought Reform => The Troubled Teen Industry => Topic started by: FreeOfCC on July 07, 2010, 05:37:08 PM
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http://www.texastribune.org/texas-state ... exas-rtcs/ (http://www.texastribune.org/texas-state-agencies/dept-of-family-and-protective-services/out-of-state-kids-may-suffer-in-texas-rtcs/)
Out of State Kids May Suffer in Texas Care Facilities
by Emily Ramshaw <http://www.texastribune.org/about/staff/emily-ramshaw/>
June 14, 2010
<#>
Richard DeMaar in his Fairbanks, Alaska home.
Alaska officials sent 16-year-old Richard DeMaar 4,000 miles away from his parents to a Texas psychiatric facility because his home state
wasn't equipped to handle his severe depression. Within six weeks, he had tied a bed sheet over the bathroom door, climbed up onto a trashcan
and slipped the makeshift noose around his neck, strangling to death.
Richard was one of roughly 900 out-of-state kids sent to a Texas residential treatment center in the last five years --- part of a
national compact that allows states that don't have adequate psychiatric or mental health services to send kids to states that do. The practice
is designed to help troubled kids get the level of care they need, regardless of where they call home. But it's increasingly coming under
fire from children's health advocates, who say it takes kids away from their families and their communities --- two things they need to make a
full-fledged recovery.
"It's not fair to the parents, to the kid, to send them out of the state, to send them too far for people to visit," Richard's mother,
Elizabeth DeMaar, said from her home in Fairbanks, fighting back sobs. "He was so scared to be so far away."
Child welfare experts say the Interstate Compact on the Placement of
Children
<http://www.dfps.state.tx.us/adoption_and_foster_care/about_tare/adoption/icpc.asp> --- known more familiarly as the "icky picky" --- is often a necessary
tool. In some cases, a troubled child in the custody of one state has kin or a potential guardian in another state. In other cases, the closest care facility to home is actually across a state line. And then there are states with low populations or limited resources, which simply don't have the level of treatment an extremely sick or disturbed child needs.
"Alaska is a classic example," said F. Scott McCown
<http://www.cppp.org/about/staff.php#mccown>, a former state district
judge who runs the Austin-based Center for Public Policy Priorities
<http://www.cppp.org/>. "They've got to find a placement that wants the
kid, a placement that can meet the kid's needs and a placement that they
can afford. And to some extent, whether that placement is in Washington
State or in San Antonio, it doesn't much matter."
But some advocates say the strategy is completely misguided. Alison
Barkoff, a senior staff attorney with the Washington, D.C.-based Bazelon
Center for Mental Health Law <http://www.bazelon.org/>, said residential
treatment centers are already a troubling environment: Kids pick up the
behavioral problems of their peers, get disconnected from the real world
and regress when they're back in their own homes, schools and
communities. Add an out-of-state placement to the mix, she said, and
these problems are only exacerbated --- especially since parents and
guardians have no way to monitor care or living conditions.
"Not only can you not address your needs in your home environment," said
Barkoff, who noted that many inner-city D.C. kids are placed in
residential treatment centers as far away as Utah and Minnesota. "You
can't even make meaningful contact with your family."
*Richard's story*
Richard's troubles began in his early teens. He was kicked out of school
twice. He got high and drunk while his parents worked nights at the
local hospital. And he slept more than half the day. Still, family
pictures show a floppy-haired, baby-faced teen with a bashful smile and
the last remnants of adolescent acne.**
Richard's condition spiraled out of control in late 2005, when the
16-year-old sank into a deep depression and started considering suicide.
First, he was taken to Fairbanks Memorial Hospital
<http://www.bannerhealth.com/Locations/Alaska/Fairbanks+Memorial+Hospital/_FMH_DC_Home.htm>
after he was found intoxicated and cutting his wrists in the street. The
next month he took more than a dozen painkillers out of the family
medicine cabinet and had to be admitted to an Anchorage youth
psychiatric facility. But when workers there found Richard had made a
noose out of his torn bed sheet and had plans to hang himself, they
moved him by stretcher to yet another facility, the Alaska Psychiatric
Institute <http://www.hss.state.ak.us/DBH/API/default.htm> in Anchorage.
At API, Richard told counselors he wished he was dead, that he had no
will to live. "High risk [for] suicide," the therapists wrote on his
intake forms. "Dangerous to self."
Richard needed long-term care, more than API --- or any other Alaska
facility --- could provide. With all their in-state options depleted,
Alaska officials used the interstate compact in February 2006 to
transfer Richard to the Laurel Ridge Treatment Center
<http://www.laurelridgetc.com/> in San Antonio --- one of 25
out-of-state facilities, from Utah to South Carolina, covered by Alaska
Medicaid.
The DeMaars were hesitant. Texas was so far, and Richard was so
resistant. But they figured that with his suicidal tendencies and with
Alaska's confidence in Laurel Ridge, their son would be monitored around
the clock. "The only option was to send him out of state," DeMaar said.
"We just tried to cooperate. The only thing we wanted was for him to get
well."
Yet quickly, Richard's parents felt something wasn't right. Every time
they called, Richard was asleep or "out on activities." They played
endless games of phone tag with facility therapists who, when they
connected, told the DeMaars that Richard was improving. But on April 9,
2006, the DeMaars received a call telling them Richard had committed
suicide.
"We searched the internet frantically to find out what we did wrong,"
said DeMaar, whose husband died unexpectedly three months after her son.
"We trusted completely the people who deal with this on a daily basis."
A "discharge summary" Laurel Ridge prepared after Richard's death stated
that the suicide was "totally unexpected given his apparent good
adjustment at the program." But an investigation by the Texas Department
of Family and Protective Services <http://www.dfps.state.tx.us/>
revealed Laurel Ridge had violated its own facility policy by failing to
check on Richard every 15 minutes. Officials with Laurel Ridge and its
parent company, Psychiatric Solutions, Inc.
<http://www.psysolutions.com/index.html>, did not return phone calls or
emails seeking comment.
*"So many red flags"*
In the years since Richard's death, Alaska has dramatically curbed
out-of-state placements through a project called Bring The Kids Home
<http://www.mhtrust.org/calendar/index.cfm?fa=catalog_class&classid=75>
--- a statewide effort to provide care within Alaska's borders. State
officials realized they had to: Between 1998 and 2004, Alaska's
out-of-state residential treatment center placements grew by nearly 800
percent, from 80 to nearly 750 a year.
Brita Bishop, the coordinator of the Bring The Kids Home program, said
the out-of-state placements led kids to feel disconnected and to have
weaker outcomes, all at a high cost to the state. When the state stopped
sending so many kids out of state, she said, it saw recidivism rates
drop and expenditures plummet --- and officials were able to invest more
resources into intensive community care and therapeutic foster homes.
"What we recognized was, it was culturally disconnecting for kids from
Alaska to be in Texas," she said. "... Now, we stop and say, 'Wait a
minute. We haven't exhausted all of the in-state options yet.'"
DeMaar, meanwhile, is left with nothing but questions. Why was her
suicidal son left with sheets, with a trashcan, with anything that could
be used to help him take his own life? Why were the 15-minute checks
overlooked? And most chilling, would it have been different if he'd
remained close to home, where his parents and siblings could visit and
participate in his care?
"The director [at Laurel Ridge] told me some suicides are inevitable,
that sometimes there's nothing you can do," DeMaar said. "But there were
so many red flags."
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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Yet quickly, Richard’s parents felt something wasn’t right. Every time they called, Richard was asleep or “out on activities.” They played endless games of phone tag with facility therapists who, when they connected, told the DeMaars that Richard was improving. But on April 9, 2006, the DeMaars received a call telling them Richard had committed suicide.
This poor kid was sent all the way to Texas and his parents were disallowed from talking to him by phone.
Yet another example of how the brainwashing starts in these places. Separate the kid from the outside world including communication with parents. Then the staff commence with the psychological torment.
I guess Richard wasn't really improving.
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Yet quickly, Richard’s parents felt something wasn’t right. Every time they called, Richard was asleep or “out on activities.” They played endless games of phone tag with facility therapists who, when they connected, told the DeMaars that Richard was improving. But on April 9, 2006, the DeMaars received a call telling them Richard had committed suicide.
This poor kid was sent all the way to Texas and his parents were disallowed from talking to him by phone.
Yet another example of how the brainwashing starts in these places. Separate the kid from the outside world including communication with parents. Then the staff commence with the psychological torment.
I guess Richard wasn't really improving.
The child was suicidal prior to being sent to Texas. He wasnt improving in Alaska. I read this write up 2 times and there was no indication that this child was tortured or abused at all. Where does this conclusion come from? Where was the brain washing taking place? I didnt see this either. Are you saying the brainwashing took place "on the premises" or was he taken off site for this? I believe it is a regulated facility and if there were signs of early onset of brainwashing I am sure this would have been reported.
It fascinates me that so many people here think there is this covert brainwashing going on under every bodies noses but no one can see it. I have never seen any facility written up for this during inspections and you would think there would be some ex-employees who would come forward and speak out about where this brainwashing is taking place if it is truly happening.
If the child suddenly improved overnight and walked around smiling then maybe I would buy into the whole brainwashing theory and he would be alive today if it were true. I just dont see any bases at all for concluding this.
...
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Nope, no one ever commits suicide as a result of having their adolescent life fucked up by brainwashing facilities...never happens. Programs try to help kids; a kid who does something like that must either be disturbed/suicidal to begin with, or a "druggie" lowlife...a lot of those druggies end up doing that to themselves anyway, right?
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Sorry, but I found it a bit difficult to read the OP with all the internal links written out as text within the article, not to mention the altered formatting, so here's that article recopied:
-------------- • -------------- • --------------
The Texas Tribune
Out of State Kids May Suffer in Texas Care Facilities (http://http://www.texastribune.org/texas-state-agencies/dept-of-family-and-protective-services/out-of-state-kids-may-suffer-in-texas-rtcs/)
by Emily Ramshaw
June 14, 2010
(http://http://static.texastribune.org/media/images/RichardDeMaar003_jpg_260x1000_q100.jpg)
Richard DeMaar in his Fairbanks, Alaska home. photo by: Elizabeth DeMaar
Alaska officials sent 16-year-old Richard DeMaar 4,000 miles away from his parents to a Texas psychiatric facility because his home state wasn't equipped to handle his severe depression. Within six weeks, he had tied a bed sheet over the bathroom door, climbed up onto a trashcan and slipped the makeshift noose around his neck, strangling to death.
Richard was one of roughly 900 out-of-state kids sent to a Texas residential treatment center in the last five years — part of a national compact that allows states that don't have adequate psychiatric or mental health services to send kids to states that do. The practice is designed to help troubled kids get the level of care they need, regardless of where they call home. But it's increasingly coming under fire from children's health advocates, who say it takes kids away from their families and their communities — two things they need to make a full-fledged recovery.
"It's not fair to the parents, to the kid, to send them out of the state, to send them too far for people to visit," Richard's mother, Elizabeth DeMaar, said from her home in Fairbanks, fighting back sobs. "He was so scared to be so far away."
Child welfare experts say the Interstate Compact on the Placement of Children (http://http://www.dfps.state.tx.us/adoption_and_foster_care/about_tare/adoption/icpc.asp) — known more familiarly as the "icky picky" — is often a necessary tool. In some cases, a troubled child in the custody of one state has kin or a potential guardian in another state. In other cases, the closest care facility to home is actually across a state line. And then there are states with low populations or limited resources, which simply don't have the level of treatment an extremely sick or disturbed child needs.
"Alaska is a classic example," said F. Scott McCown (http://http://www.cppp.org/about/staff.php#mccown), a former state district judge who runs the Austin-based Center for Public Policy Priorities (http://http://www.cppp.org/). "They've got to find a placement that wants the kid, a placement that can meet the kid's needs and a placement that they can afford. And to some extent, whether that placement is in Washington State or in San Antonio, it doesn't much matter."
But some advocates say the strategy is completely misguided. Alison Barkoff, a senior staff attorney with the Washington, D.C.-based Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law (http://http://www.bazelon.org/), said residential treatment centers are already a troubling environment: Kids pick up the behavioral problems of their peers, get disconnected from the real world and regress when they're back in their own homes, schools and communities. Add an out-of-state placement to the mix, she said, and these problems are only exacerbated — especially since parents and guardians have no way to monitor care or living conditions.
"Not only can you not address your needs in your home environment," said Barkoff, who noted that many inner-city D.C. kids are placed in residential treatment centers as far away as Utah and Minnesota. "You can't even make meaningful contact with your family."
Richard's story
Richard's troubles began in his early teens. He was kicked out of school twice. He got high and drunk while his parents worked nights at the local hospital. And he slept more than half the day. Still, family pictures show a floppy-haired, baby-faced teen with a bashful smile and the last remnants of adolescent acne.
Richard's condition spiraled out of control in late 2005, when the 16-year-old sank into a deep depression and started considering suicide. First, he was taken to Fairbanks Memorial Hospital (http://http://www.bannerhealth.com/Locations/Alaska/Fairbanks+Memorial+Hospital/_FMH_DC_Home.htm) after he was found intoxicated and cutting his wrists in the street. The next month he took more than a dozen painkillers out of the family medicine cabinet and had to be admitted to an Anchorage youth psychiatric facility. But when workers there found Richard had made a noose out of his torn bed sheet and had plans to hang himself, they moved him by stretcher to yet another facility, the Alaska Psychiatric Institute (http://http://www.hss.state.ak.us/DBH/API/default.htm) in Anchorage. At API, Richard told counselors he wished he was dead, that he had no will to live. "High risk [for] suicide," the therapists wrote on his intake forms. "Dangerous to self."
Richard needed long-term care, more than API — or any other Alaska facility — could provide. With all their in-state options depleted, Alaska officials used the interstate compact in February 2006 to transfer Richard to the Laurel Ridge Treatment Center (http://http://www.laurelridgetc.com/) in San Antonio — one of 25 out-of-state facilities, from Utah to South Carolina, covered by Alaska Medicaid.
The DeMaars were hesitant. Texas was so far, and Richard was so resistant. But they figured that with his suicidal tendencies and with Alaska's confidence in Laurel Ridge, their son would be monitored around the clock. "The only option was to send him out of state," DeMaar said. "We just tried to cooperate. The only thing we wanted was for him to get well."
Yet quickly, Richard's parents felt something wasn't right. Every time they called, Richard was asleep or "out on activities." They played endless games of phone tag with facility therapists who, when they connected, told the DeMaars that Richard was improving. But on April 9, 2006, the DeMaars received a call telling them Richard had committed suicide.
"We searched the internet frantically to find out what we did wrong," said DeMaar, whose husband died unexpectedly three months after her son. "We trusted completely the people who deal with this on a daily basis."
A "discharge summary" Laurel Ridge prepared after Richard's death stated that the suicide was "totally unexpected given his apparent good adjustment at the program." But an investigation by the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (http://http://www.dfps.state.tx.us/) revealed Laurel Ridge had violated its own facility policy by failing to check on Richard every 15 minutes. Officials with Laurel Ridge and its parent company, Psychiatric Solutions, Inc. (http://http://www.psysolutions.com/index.html), did not return phone calls or emails seeking comment.
"So many red flags"
In the years since Richard's death, Alaska has dramatically curbed out-of-state placements through a project called Bring The Kids Home (http://http://www.mhtrust.org/calendar/index.cfm?fa=catalog_class&classid=75) — a statewide effort to provide care within Alaska's borders. State officials realized they had to: Between 1998 and 2004, Alaska's out-of-state residential treatment center placements grew by nearly 800 percent, from 80 to nearly 750 a year.
Brita Bishop, the coordinator of the Bring The Kids Home program, said the out-of-state placements led kids to feel disconnected and to have weaker outcomes, all at a high cost to the state. When the state stopped sending so many kids out of state, she said, it saw recidivism rates drop and expenditures plummet — and officials were able to invest more resources into intensive community care and therapeutic foster homes.
"What we recognized was, it was culturally disconnecting for kids from Alaska to be in Texas," she said. "... Now, we stop and say, 'Wait a minute. We haven't exhausted all of the in-state options yet.' "
DeMaar, meanwhile, is left with nothing but questions. Why was her suicidal son left with sheets, with a trashcan, with anything that could be used to help him take his own life? Why were the 15-minute checks overlooked? And most chilling, would it have been different if he'd remained close to home, where his parents and siblings could visit and participate in his care?
"The director [at Laurel Ridge] told me some suicides are inevitable, that sometimes there's nothing you can do," DeMaar said. "But there were so many red flags."
© 2010 The Texas Tribune
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Yet quickly, Richard’s parents felt something wasn’t right. Every time they called, Richard was asleep or “out on activities.” They played endless games of phone tag with facility therapists who, when they connected, told the DeMaars that Richard was improving. But on April 9, 2006, the DeMaars received a call telling them Richard had committed suicide.
This poor kid was sent all the way to Texas and his parents were disallowed from talking to him by phone.
Yet another example of how the brainwashing starts in these places. Separate the kid from the outside world including communication with parents. Then the staff commence with the psychological torment.
I guess Richard wasn't really improving.
The child was suicidal prior to being sent to Texas. He wasnt improving in Alaska. I read this write up 2 times and there was no indication that this child was tortured or abused at all. Where does this conclusion come from? Where was the brain washing taking place? I didnt see this either. Are you saying the brainwashing took place "on the premises" or was he taken off site for this? I believe it is a regulated facility and if there were signs of early onset of brainwashing I am sure this would have been reported.
It fascinates me that so many people here think there is this covert brainwashing going on under every bodies noses but no one can see it. I have never seen any facility written up for this during inspections and you would think there would be some ex-employees who would come forward and speak out about where this brainwashing is taking place if it is truly happening.
If the child suddenly improved overnight and walked around smiling then maybe I would buy into the whole brainwashing theory and he would be alive today if it were true. I just dont see any bases at all for concluding this.
Lol. This facility is owned by Psychiatric Solutions Inc. How many deaths have they had now?
The kid was supposed to be checked every 15 minutes. They did not even follow their own SOP:
A "discharge summary" Laurel Ridge prepared after Richard's death stated that the suicide was "totally unexpected given his apparent good adjustment at the program." But an investigation by the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (http://http://www.dfps.state.tx.us/) revealed Laurel Ridge had violated its own facility policy by failing to check on Richard every 15 minutes. Officials with Laurel Ridge and its parent company, Psychiatric Solutions, Inc. (http://http://www.psysolutions.com/index.html), did not return phone calls or emails seeking comment.[/list]
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Nope, no one ever commits suicide as a result of having their adolescent life fucked up by brainwashing facilities...never happens. Programs try to help kids; a kid who does something like that must either be disturbed/suicidal to begin with, or a "druggie" lowlife...a lot of those druggies end up doing that to themselves anyway, right?
I wouldnt call the kid a druggie just because he tried to overdose on pain killers, Frod, come on. I define a druggie as maybe a kid who lives on the streets or on his parents couch with no job over the age of twenty doing drugs all day. The child was mostly clean and tried to take his life several times prior to being transferred to Texas. I dont see how anyone can conclude that the facility caused this. There is no sign of brainwashing anywhere or of any abuse and no one here has bothered to point out how they conclude this.
Its just screwy how people can sit here on the internet and say "Oh look that kid committed suicide so the public school he attended must have been brainwashing him and abused him mentally"
...
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Nope, no one ever commits suicide as a result of having their adolescent life fucked up by brainwashing facilities...never happens. Programs try to help kids; a kid who does something like that must either be disturbed/suicidal to begin with, or a "druggie" lowlife...a lot of those druggies end up doing that to themselves anyway, right?
I wouldnt call the kid a druggie just because he tried to overdose on pain killers, Frod, come on. I define a druggie as maybe a kid who lives on the streets or on his parents couch with no job over the age of twenty doing drugs all day. The child was mostly clean and tried to take his life several times prior to being transferred to Texas. I dont see how anyone can conclude that the facility caused this. There is no sign of brainwashing anywhere or of any abuse and no one here has bothered to point out how they conclude this.
Its just screwy how people can sit here on the internet and say "Oh look that kid committed suicide so the public school he attended must have been brainwashing him and abused him mentally"
Like I said, this facility is owned by Psychiatric Solutions Inc. PSI already has a number of deaths racked up during their history of returning mega-profits for their investors. They have earned a reputation for putting patients at risk.
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Yet quickly, Richard’s parents felt something wasn’t right. Every time they called, Richard was asleep or “out on activities.” They played endless games of phone tag with facility therapists who, when they connected, told the DeMaars that Richard was improving. But on April 9, 2006, the DeMaars received a call telling them Richard had committed suicide.
This poor kid was sent all the way to Texas and his parents were disallowed from talking to him by phone.
Yet another example of how the brainwashing starts in these places. Separate the kid from the outside world including communication with parents. Then the staff commence with the psychological torment.
I guess Richard wasn't really improving.
The child was suicidal prior to being sent to Texas. He wasnt improving in Alaska. I read this write up 2 times and there was no indication that this child was tortured or abused at all. Where does this conclusion come from? Where was the brain washing taking place? I didnt see this either. Are you saying the brainwashing took place "on the premises" or was he taken off site for this? I believe it is a regulated facility and if there were signs of early onset of brainwashing I am sure this would have been reported.
It fascinates me that so many people here think there is this covert brainwashing going on under every bodies noses but no one can see it. I have never seen any facility written up for this during inspections and you would think there would be some ex-employees who would come forward and speak out about where this brainwashing is taking place if it is truly happening.
If the child suddenly improved overnight and walked around smiling then maybe I would buy into the whole brainwashing theory and he would be alive today if it were true. I just dont see any bases at all for concluding this.
Lol. This facility is owned by Psychiatric Solutions Inc. How many deaths have they had now?
The kid was supposed to be checked every 15 minutes. They did not even follow their own SOP:
A "discharge summary" Laurel Ridge prepared after Richard's death stated that the suicide was "totally unexpected given his apparent good adjustment at the program." But an investigation by the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (http://http://www.dfps.state.tx.us/) revealed Laurel Ridge had violated its own facility policy by failing to check on Richard every 15 minutes. Officials with Laurel Ridge and its parent company, Psychiatric Solutions, Inc. (http://http://www.psysolutions.com/index.html), did not return phone calls or emails seeking comment.[/list]
Again, how does that translate into Brainwashing and mental abuse or torture? How is this concluded? The place was investigated by the Texas Department of Family Services and if they found abuse or brainwashing going on they would have reported it along with the other findings.
If they are handling suicidal patients, Ursus, then one would expect the death rate to be much higher than say a facility which housed kids with behavior issues or a typical cross section of the public school system.
If you walked into a cardiologist office you would see a lot of people in the waiting room with heart problems. If more of his patients died prematurely than say the patients of his friend who is a dentist it wouldnt mean that you should avoid that waiting room or that the Dentist does a better job at keeping people alive.
Do you see what I mean?
...
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Nope, no one ever commits suicide as a result of having their adolescent life fucked up by brainwashing facilities...never happens. Programs try to help kids; a kid who does something like that must either be disturbed/suicidal to begin with, or a "druggie" lowlife...a lot of those druggies end up doing that to themselves anyway, right?
I wouldnt call the kid a druggie just because he tried to overdose on pain killers, Frod, come on. I define a druggie as maybe a kid who lives on the streets or on his parents couch with no job over the age of twenty doing drugs all day. The child was mostly clean and tried to take his life several times prior to being transferred to Texas. I dont see how anyone can conclude that the facility caused this. There is no sign of brainwashing anywhere or of any abuse and no one here has bothered to point out how they conclude this.
Its just screwy how people can sit here on the internet and say "Oh look that kid committed suicide so the public school he attended must have been brainwashing him and abused him mentally"
First of all, question for anyone: what is an RTC (wtf does it stand for)? I don't think we're talking about a public school here. I don't know about this case in particular, but I have to wonder what was going on in that place.
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Nope, no one ever commits suicide as a result of having their adolescent life fucked up by brainwashing facilities...never happens. Programs try to help kids; a kid who does something like that must either be disturbed/suicidal to begin with, or a "druggie" lowlife...a lot of those druggies end up doing that to themselves anyway, right?
I wouldnt call the kid a druggie just because he tried to overdose on pain killers, Frod, come on. I define a druggie as maybe a kid who lives on the streets or on his parents couch with no job over the age of twenty doing drugs all day. The child was mostly clean and tried to take his life several times prior to being transferred to Texas. I dont see how anyone can conclude that the facility caused this. There is no sign of brainwashing anywhere or of any abuse and no one here has bothered to point out how they conclude this.
Its just screwy how people can sit here on the internet and say "Oh look that kid committed suicide so the public school he attended must have been brainwashing him and abused him mentally"
First of all, question for anyone: what is an RTC (wtf does it stand for)? I don't think we're talking about a public school here. I don't know about this case in particular, but I have to wonder what was going on in that place.
Frod, it stands for Residential Treatment Center. Some people here on fornits seem to think RTCs brain wash people into committing suicide and that suicide is caused by brainwashing and mental torture.
If we follow that line of logic then all the kids that commit suicide that attend public schools must be getting brainwashed there also and were mentally abused and tortured.
That’s where the reference to Public schools came into play. As far as what went on inside, we would have to look at the State of Texas’ investigation report. So far Ursus has uncovered that the boy wasn’t looked in on “Every 15 minutes” as they were supposed to. Was it every 16 minutes or maybe just once a day.. we don’t know at this point.
...
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First of all, question for anyone: what is an RTC (wtf does it stand for)? I don't think we're talking about a public school here. I don't know about this case in particular, but I have to wonder what was going on in that place.
Residential Treatment Center. In practice, the term appears to cover a range of institutions, ranging from a full-out long-term psychiatric lock-up to a more restrictive therapeutic boarding school which necessitates the employ of psychiatric and psychological professionals.
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So far Ursus has uncovered that the boy wasn't looked in on "Every 15 minutes" as they were supposed to. Was it every 16 minutes or maybe just once a day.. we don't know at this point.
I am sure that Richard DeMaar's mother would feel most grateful for your concern for details.
Re. another suicide attempt in one of PSI's facilities in Texas (don't know which one):
"In Texas, workers documented making routine 15-minute checks on a suicidal patient, but surveillance video showed a 26-minute gap. In the meantime, the patient had asphyxiated himself, wrapping strips of a pillowcase around his neck."[/list]
You can learn more about Psychiatric Solutions Inc.'s sordid history in this thread:
Psychiatric care's peril and profits - PSI · viewtopic.php?f=71&t=30765 (http://www.fornits.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=71&t=30765)[/list]
"Lapses in care at Psychiatric Solutions Inc., a major hospital chain with high earnings, have put patients at risk, regulators find. Some have even died."[/list][/list]
This was an 2008 investigation by Christina Jewett and Robin Fields, writers for ProPublica.
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I am sure that Richard DeMaar's mother would feel most grateful for your concern for details.
If we had the details to be concerned about, maybe, but we don’t at this time.
"In Texas, workers documented making routine 15-minute checks on a suicidal patient, but surveillance video showed a 26-minute gap. In the meantime, the patient had asphyxiated himself, wrapping strips of a pillowcase around his neck."
So worse case they were eleven minutes late. It seems they need to put a better process in place because this is “at least” the second time this has happened. Night watchmen in security areas have to use a keycard to indicate they have checked each area on time and each night. If they put card readers at each room then the staff could swip the card reader after checking in on the patient and if they exceed the time limit, by say 10 minute, then an alert would sound indicating they missed the 15 minute check.
You can learn more about Psychiatric Solutions Inc.'s sordid history in this thread:
Psychiatric care's peril and profits - PSI • viewtopic.php?f=71&t=30765
"Lapses in care at Psychiatric Solutions Inc., a major hospital chain with high earnings, have put patients at risk, regulators find. Some have even died."
This was an 2008 investigation by Christina Jewett and Robin Fields, writers for ProPublica.
Thanks for the link, Ursus, Since they are regulated and have been under a microscope they have probably met the concerns from the audits, investigations and made the necessary changes. I didn’t see any mention of brainwashing or torture so we need to be careful because many of the reports about this place seem to be blown out of proportion or at the very least greatly embellished.
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So worse case they were eleven minutes late.
Uh, worst case is that the child is dead. Because they were eleven minutes late, in violation of their own policy; in violation of the promise made to this child and his mother when they promised to care for him according to their policy.
Dead kids don't faze polemicist ideologues like Whooter. He's in it for the money. (http://http://www.fornits.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=48&t=29342&start=480#p368992)
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So worse case they were eleven minutes late.
Uh, worst case is that the child is dead. Because they were eleven minutes late, in violation of their own policy; in violation of the promise made to this child and his mother when they promised to care for him according to their policy.
Dead kids don't faze polemicist ideologues like Whooter. He's in it for the money. (http://http://www.fornits.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=48&t=29342&start=480#p368992)
We dont know if the time lapse is related to the death. The child may have hung himself 3 minutes after the previous inspection. The late check-ins are an indication of a problem but not necessarily related to the cause. Its important to keep these two separate when trying to determine root cause.
What we do know is that the staff were checking in on the kids within 26 minutes or less against a requirement of every 15 minutes maximum. This may be an isolated case or it may be the norm. It sounds like a staffing issue along with a need to upgrade some of their processes.
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"In Texas, workers documented making routine 15-minute checks on a suicidal patient, but surveillance video showed a 26-minute gap. In the meantime, the patient had asphyxiated himself, wrapping strips of a pillowcase around his neck."
So worse case they were eleven minutes late. It seems they need to put a better process in place because this is "at least" the second time this has happened. Night watchmen in security areas have to use a keycard to indicate they have checked each area on time and each night. If they put card readers at each room then the staff could swip the card reader after checking in on the patient and if they exceed the time limit, by say 10 minute, then an alert would sound indicating they missed the 15 minute check.
Geeezz. I don't think installing a card swiper for every room can even begin to address the problem. It would appear to be a lot more ... systemic. If Psychiatric Solutions Inc.'s business paradigm is to decrease staffing in order to increase profits, card swipers can't ensure that patients are getting the appropriate care if there simply isn't enough personnel in place to provide that care, let alone qualified and appropriately trained personnel!
There's also another downside to having a shorthanded staff lineup, and that has to do with staff morale. Just how conscientious and professional can the care be, if staff are undertrained, stressed out, and probably even pissed off, be it due to too intense a load of difficult patients and/or an unsympathetic employer?
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"In Texas, workers documented making routine 15-minute checks on a suicidal patient, but surveillance video showed a 26-minute gap. In the meantime, the patient had asphyxiated himself, wrapping strips of a pillowcase around his neck."
So worse case they were eleven minutes late. It seems they need to put a better process in place because this is "at least" the second time this has happened. Night watchmen in security areas have to use a keycard to indicate they have checked each area on time and each night. If they put card readers at each room then the staff could swip the card reader after checking in on the patient and if they exceed the time limit, by say 10 minute, then an alert would sound indicating they missed the 15 minute check.
Geeezz. I don't think installing a card swiper for every room can even begin to address the problem. It would appear to be a lot more ... systemic. If Psychiatric Solutions Inc.'s business paradigm is to decrease staffing in order to increase profits, card swipers can't ensure that patients are getting the appropriate care if there simply isn't enough personnel in place to provide that care, let alone qualified and appropriately trained personnel!
There's also another downside to having a shorthanded staff lineup, and that has to do with staff morale. Just how conscientious and professional can the care be, if staff are undertrained, stressed out, and probably even pissed off, be it due to too intense a load of difficult patients and/or an unsympathetic employer?
I agree 100%, if morale is low the card swipe's will not help. I was just addressing the issue of insuring that the 15 minute time line was met. That seemed to be the issue presented in the earlier thread.
The present economy probably doesnt help with getting them to hire more staff.
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Yet quickly, Richard’s parents felt something wasn’t right. Every time they called, Richard was asleep or “out on activities.” They played endless games of phone tag with facility therapists who, when they connected, told the DeMaars that Richard was improving. But on April 9, 2006, the DeMaars received a call telling them Richard had committed suicide.
This poor kid was sent all the way to Texas and his parents were disallowed from talking to him by phone.
Yet another example of how the brainwashing starts in these places. Separate the kid from the outside world including communication with parents. Then the staff commence with the psychological torment.
I guess Richard wasn't really improving.
The child was suicidal prior to being sent to Texas. He wasnt improving in Alaska. I read this write up 2 times and there was no indication that this child was tortured or abused at all. Where does this conclusion come from? Where was the brain washing taking place? I didnt see this either. Are you saying the brainwashing took place "on the premises" or was he taken off site for this? I believe it is a regulated facility and if there were signs of early onset of brainwashing I am sure this would have been reported.
It fascinates me that so many people here think there is this covert brainwashing going on under every bodies noses but no one can see it. I have never seen any facility written up for this during inspections and you would think there would be some ex-employees who would come forward and speak out about where this brainwashing is taking place if it is truly happening.
If the child suddenly improved overnight and walked around smiling then maybe I would buy into the whole brainwashing theory and he would be alive today if it were true. I just dont see any bases at all for concluding this.
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Cutting off communication with family is a well known cult technique used in the brainwashing process.
Why did Richard Commit suicide? We just don't know exactly. But I think it is safe to say the program didn't help him or allow communication with his parents. Why couldn't Richard call his parents back when he wasn't asleep or out on activities? What were these time consuming activities? If he had been able to contact the outside world we might have an answer as to what was actually happening in this facility.
If you don't believe brainwashing is real, perhaps you should read up on the subject. It is very real.
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Yet quickly, Richard’s parents felt something wasn’t right. Every time they called, Richard was asleep or “out on activities.” They played endless games of phone tag with facility therapists who, when they connected, told the DeMaars that Richard was improving. But on April 9, 2006, the DeMaars received a call telling them Richard had committed suicide.
This poor kid was sent all the way to Texas and his parents were disallowed from talking to him by phone.
Yet another example of how the brainwashing starts in these places. Separate the kid from the outside world including communication with parents. Then the staff commence with the psychological torment.
I guess Richard wasn't really improving.
The child was suicidal prior to being sent to Texas. He wasnt improving in Alaska. I read this write up 2 times and there was no indication that this child was tortured or abused at all. Where does this conclusion come from? Where was the brain washing taking place? I didnt see this either. Are you saying the brainwashing took place "on the premises" or was he taken off site for this? I believe it is a regulated facility and if there were signs of early onset of brainwashing I am sure this would have been reported.
It fascinates me that so many people here think there is this covert brainwashing going on under every bodies noses but no one can see it. I have never seen any facility written up for this during inspections and you would think there would be some ex-employees who would come forward and speak out about where this brainwashing is taking place if it is truly happening.
If the child suddenly improved overnight and walked around smiling then maybe I would buy into the whole brainwashing theory and he would be alive today if it were true. I just dont see any bases at all for concluding this.
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Cutting off communication with family is a well known cult technique used in the brainwashing process.
Why did Richard Commit suicide? We just don't know exactly. But I think it is safe to say the program didn't help him or allow communication with his parents. Why couldn't Richard call his parents back when he wasn't asleep or out on activities? What were these time consuming activities? If he had been able to contact the outside world we might have an answer as to what was actually happening in this facility.
If you don't believe brainwashing is real, perhaps you should read up on the subject. It is very real.
No one mentioned he couldn’t contact the outside world. It said that his parents tried to call and their son was asleep or on activities. They played phone tag which means the facility tried to call them but they were not available at those times. But that doesn’t mean that the parents household was a cult.
I admit that it seems strange that the parents had difficulty getting through. But these huge leaps to classifying a place as a cult using mind control techniques and torture because of it just shows how loose the definition is here.
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No one mentioned he couldn’t contact the outside world. It said that his parents tried to call and their son was asleep or on activities. They played phone tag which means the facility tried to call them but they were not available at those times. But that doesn’t mean that the parents household was a cult.
LOLs. Blatant attempt at obfuscation. You're really slipping today, Hoots... :roflmao:
Or was that perchance ... a Freudian slip?
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No one mentioned he couldn’t contact the outside world. It said that his parents tried to call and their son was asleep or on activities. They played phone tag which means the facility tried to call them but they were not available at those times. But that doesn’t mean that the parents household was a cult.
LOLs. Blatant attempt at obfuscation. You're really slipping today, Hoots... :roflmao:
Or was that perchance ... a Freudian slip?
Ha,Ha,Ha kind of gets the point across though doesnt it? By the definition here on fornits (of cult) the department of Motor vehicle (here in Massachusetts) would definitely be classified as a cult because we cant get through to anyone there since the budget cuts!!! lol.
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I was debating whether or not to toss Richard on the Pile. Actual psychiatric facilities are outside my purview.
But taking a kid from out of state, telling a whole lot of lies about the kind of care he was getting (standard program business), failing to let his parents contact him (more standard program business), failing to provide supervision, and practically encouraging an obviously suicidal kid to go ahead and and do it?
Yeah, this place isn't an actual psychiatric facility. It's a program. So this one's going on the list.
Gotta catch 'em all!
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"In Texas, workers documented making routine 15-minute checks on a suicidal patient, but surveillance video showed a 26-minute gap. In the meantime, the patient had asphyxiated himself, wrapping strips of a pillowcase around his neck."
So worse case they were eleven minutes late. It seems they need to put a better process in place because this is "at least" the second time this has happened. Night watchmen in security areas have to use a keycard to indicate they have checked each area on time and each night. If they put card readers at each room then the staff could swip the card reader after checking in on the patient and if they exceed the time limit, by say 10 minute, then an alert would sound indicating they missed the 15 minute check.
Here's another account from the same article (http://http://www.fornits.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=71&t=30765), about yet another suicide attempt in a Texas facility, to give some more perspective on how Psychiatric Solutions Inc. stretches those "15 minute checks":
"Steven Nickel woke up just after 2 a.m. lying on the floor of his shower. The water was running, flooding into his room at Cypress Creek, a PSI hospital in Houston.
He had tried to kill himself, cutting his left wrist with a razor, federal inspection records show. Workers were supposed to check on him every 15 minutes that night in May 2007, yet he had been slumped over the drain, unconscious, for about five hours."[/list]
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I was debating whether or not to toss Richard on the Pile. Actual psychiatric facilities are outside my purview.
But taking a kid from out of state, telling a whole lot of lies about the kind of care he was getting (standard program business), failing to let his parents contact him (more standard program business), failing to provide supervision, and practically encouraging an obviously suicidal kid to go ahead and and do it?
Yeah, this place isn't an actual psychiatric facility. It's a program. So this one's going on the list.
Gotta catch 'em all!
Dam, Pile hasn't had an addition in months, been drying up lately.... I was going to predict this addition to the pile but was too late.....
Ya gotta love this place. Pile you ran that logic down beautifully, they had him in their sights right from the beginning and knew he was an easy kill....the convincing portion that tipped the scales was where the facility actually encouraged him to kill himself (beautifully said), but you need to toss in words like Cult and that he was brainwashed into killing himself to get people here really riled up to keep the anti=program flame going (forget about the part where he tried to kill himself several times before he went there).... throw him on that dam disrespectful pile!! lol Add him to your footer immediately, contact Oscar and lets add that facility to the list of brainwashing facilities!!
..... it makes you wonder how many kids were actually killed by programs when you read this.
I remember when Oscar added a "program death" of a kid who was just riding by a program in his car and died in a car accident. I dont remember how he justified it, but it sounded pretty convincing......it was the biggest stretch, but this one is close behind.
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I was debating whether or not to toss Richard on the Pile. Actual psychiatric facilities are outside my purview.
But taking a kid from out of state, telling a whole lot of lies about the kind of care he was getting (standard program business), failing to let his parents contact him (more standard program business), failing to provide supervision, and practically encouraging an obviously suicidal kid to go ahead and and do it?
Yeah, this place isn't an actual psychiatric facility. It's a program. So this one's going on the list.
Gotta catch 'em all!
Dam, I was going to predict this addition to the pile but was too late.....
Ya gotta love this place. Pile you ran that logic down beautifully, they had him in their sights right from the beginning and knew he was an easy kill....the convincing portion that tipped the scales was where the facility actually encouraged him to kill himself (beautifully said), but you need to toss in words like Cult and that he was brainwashed into killing himself to get people here really riled up to keep the anti=program flame going (forget about the part where he tried to kill himself several times before he went there).... throw him on that dam disrespectful pile!! lol Add him to your footer immediately, contact Oscar and lets add that facility to the list of brainwashing facilities!!
..... it makes you wonder how many kids were actually killed by programs when you read this.
I remember when Oscar added a "program death" of a kid who was just riding by a program in his car and died in a car accident. I dont remember how he justified it, but it sounded pretty convincing......it was the biggest stretch, but this one is close behind.
It was, in all likelihood, a preventable death. If it was in all certainty a preventable death, I guess we'll never know.
But... he was sent there because he was suicidal. They knew this; they were treating him for this; they had him on 15' checks as per their own SOP.
And yet, they did not follow their own SOP. Even if that was the only thing they did wrong, they are, at the very least, negligent.
Moreover, the facility appeared to, if anything, thwart communication between this kid and his family. I tell ya, it isn't much of stretch to imagine him feeling completely abandoned there, in a culturally foreign environment, far from Alaska. It might even have made him more suicidal.
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No one mentioned he couldn’t contact the outside world. It said that his parents tried to call and their son was asleep or on activities. They played phone tag which means the facility tried to call them but they were not available at those times. But that doesn’t mean that the parents household was a cult.
LOLs. Blatant attempt at obfuscation. You're really slipping today, Hoots... :roflmao:
Or was that perchance ... a Freudian slip?
It may seem a huge leap to opine that this PSI organization brainwashes kids. But the cult/brainwashing industry has been growing for decades. I have actually studied programs for kids and found a select few that do not implement brainwashing techniques. But these are exceptions to the majority that have failed a simple litmus test. One factor to consider is communication allowance in the beginning of a stay at any facility/program. Any legitimate program will allow private, limited daily communication.
The risks of severing communication from family far outweigh any benefit. There simply is no good reason to do this. On the contrary, brainwashing hinges largely on eliminating communication outside of a certain group.
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It was, in all likelihood, a preventable death. If it was in all certainty a preventable death, I guess we'll never know.
But... he was sent there because he was suicidal. They knew this; they were treating him for this; they had him on 15' checks as per their own SOP.
And yet, they did not follow their own SOP. Even if that was the only thing they did wrong, they are, at the very least, negligent.
Moreover, the facility appeared to, if anything, thwart communication between this kid and his family. I tell ya, it isn't much of stretch to imagine him feeling completely abandoned there, in a culturally foreign environment, far from Alaska. It might even have made him more suicidal.
I agree with this. I don’t understand what would drive someone to send a suicidal child to Texas from Alaska. What is it that they can do in Texas that cant be done in Alaska? The child was probably scared with everyone being foreign with southern accents and no contact with people who were familiar to him. Maybe this place specialized in treatment for kids with depression who didn’t respond to the mainstream therapies.
I guess I would need to understand why he was sent there. Was it for a 6 month evaluation? To try a new therapy? Was he told he would be going back to Alaska after treatment? But to think he was dumped there because of cost with little hope to return would be tragic and I could see how that would drive him to be more suicidal.
All of this is very feasible because the industry is cost driven and even more so because we are in a recession.
I know most people here on fornits believe it but I just don’t buy into the whole secret rooms where they brainwash the kids and try to get them to join a cult and torture them which results in them killing themselves or having years of PTSD. I just cant believe these facilities do that in the shadows of our health care system and get away with it without anyone ever knowing for over 40 years.
I think the kid was left there, was scared, never got a proper evaluation and realized he was worse off than he was in Alaska. The 15 minute checks probably had nothing to do with it. The child probably didn’t feel safe and knew he wouldn’t get better at this place and had no idea if he would ever get home again. It only takes a few minutes to hang yourself.
Its sad that this had to happen and that he didn’t get the help he needed.
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You're so shockingly full of it whooter, you really are.
But I love you anyway. You hurt so many people. :cheers: