BryLin closing outpatient mental health, addiction clinic in Amherst
Buffalo NewsMay 03, 2022
May 3—BryLin Behavioral Health System is closing its outpatient clinic in
The closure of the
"It was not an easy decision to make," BryLin President and CEO
The outpatient site serves hundreds of people, who are being notified and encouraged to attend all scheduled appointments. The outpatient clinic will not close until all patients have been linked to other community providers.
The move also will affect 35 employees. The company said it is working to find those employees jobs within BryLin or with other local organizations.
BryLin has not yet submitted a Prior Approval Review application to the state
The planned closure comes at a time when advocates and providers are calling for more resources to respond to a mental health crisis that worsened during the pandemic. For example, the pandemic has upended the experiences at home, school and in the community for children, leading the
The need for addiction services also has increased. Opioid-related deaths in
BryLin's closure of outpatient services is sure to affect the community, especially with the increased demand for services, said
"More providers are needed, not less, and I just hope with more funding and more effort and more awareness on mental health and substance abuse, we'll be able to grow the number of providers," she said. "Luckily in
A major issue, DuBois noted, is many providers are having difficulty finding workers, which is why she's confident the affected workers at BryLin will be able to land new jobs if they don't shift to new roles at the company's
BryLin is currently negotiating a new contract with its workers' union, 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East, and how those talks conclude could indicate how many outpatient employees move over to the hospital, said
BryLin, a for-profit operator owned by the Pleskow family, said it could not "keep up, on an outpatient basis, with the funding that other local nonprofit outpatient clinics receive." By that, Nowak explained, BryLin means that it does not receive the same kind of grant and deficit funding as other community providers.
During the pandemic, Nowak said the company's hospital revenue was increasingly covering the losses created by the outpatient clinic, which wasn't sustainable.
"Covid has kind of done a number on our operations, as you can imagine," Nowak said.
BryLin, founded in 1955, opened its
As the pandemic began in
Once the outpatient site closes, BryLin will focus all of its efforts on its inpatient mental health programs at its hospital.
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