Enloe Health shifting psych services

CHICO — When is a closure not a closure? When a facility shutters but its services continue, which will be the case with Enloe Behavioral Health.

Effective Aug. 15, Enloe Health will discontinue providing in-patient psychiatric care at its center on Cohasset Road. Staff learned the decision Monday; the news started spreading online, and Enloe confirmed it publicly Tuesday.

But, contrary to social media buzz, Enloe CEO Mike Wiltermood told this newspaper Tuesday afternoon that services will shift to the main hospital to accommodate patients with mental as well as physical conditions.

The sign in front of Enloe Behavioral Health on Cohasset Road on Tuesday, May 7, 2024 in Chico, California. (Jake Hutchison/Enterprise-Record)

“Especially since the Camp Fire and COVID, we’ve had an increasing number of patients with secondary diagnoses of mental illness coming through our emergency room requiring admission,” Wiltermood said. “The vast majority of (psychiatric) patients that we take care of have a physical ailment that we can’t accommodate at the voluntary behavioral health center.

“We’re just trying to redeploy our resources — that’s basically the reason for the closure.”

The facility at 560 Cohasset Road is the only voluntary inpatient center in Northern California, per its website; in the same complex, Butte County Behavioral Health operates a 16-bed psychiatric unit for patients referred there.

Enloe Behavioral Health has 26 beds. However, Wiltermood said, the census ranges from three to six patients — compared to 30 or more in the hospital — and the in-patient facility treats only mild conditions as opposed to complex cases.

“The vast majority of in-patient (psychiatric care) is taken care of by Butte County Behavioral Health,” he elaborated. “The closure of this very small unit doesn’t impact the services the county provides, and it won’t impact the services provided here on the Esplanade campus except that we’ll have more psychiatric support.”

Enloe Behavioral Health employs 35. Some will join Dr. Ahmed Abouesh, medical director for psychiatry, on a behavioral health team at the hospital. Others will have options to transfer to other departments — Wiltermood said Enloe Health currently has 170 unfilled openings.

“The core psychiatric team is going to be smaller,” he continued, “though we’re not sure of the composition of the team. But I’m sure the service is going to grow as we become accustomed to that support (in hospital wards), because we haven’t had that in the past.

“We’ve been very reliant on Butte County Behavioral Health to assess patients in the emergency department. Being comfortable admitting patients with mental illness as well as a physical issue, I think that’s going to make people a lot more comfortable, having those team members who are experienced in psychiatric care.”

Enloe Vice President Jolene Francis noted that the 24/7 crisis line at 530-332-5250 will remain fully staffed after the transition. Until Aug. 15, the behavioral health center will operate as it has.

“I feel very confident that having this additional psychiatric resource here is going to help us with the disposition of our patients,” Wiltermood said. “It’s going to get them better faster, hopefully get them into a non-acute setting, and it will create more bed capacity for us.”