Fewer staff injuries reported at Independence Mental Health Institute

INDEPENDENCE - The number of employees injured by patients at the Independence Mental Health Institute went down 26 percent from 2013 to 2014, according to the Iowa Department of Human Services.

Employees were injured by patients nearly 70 times in 2013, with half those injuries considered assaults.

Last year, there were 51 employee injuries with patient involvement. Of those, 16 injuries, or about 31 percent, were assaults, the Human Services Department reported.

Staff members 'work hard to treat patients who are experiencing a severe emotional disturbance,” agency spokeswoman Amy McCoy said. 'The facility provides training and techniques to help avoid injury from assaultive and/or aggressive patients.”

Buchanan County Attorney Shawn Harden said his office is seeing fewer assault reports from the Independence institute. But he added that, 'It is unclear to us whether that is a result of fewer incidents occurring or just fewer incidents being reported to law enforcement.”

Some institute employees who talked with The Gazette in 2013 said they thought Human Services was sacrificing employee safety to avoid criticism over use of physical restraints. The department was under fire after the Des Moines Register reported employees at the Iowa Juvenile Home in Toledo were terminated for using improper restraints.

Gov. Terry Branstad closed the Toledo facility in January 2014.

The agency said employees are taught to de-escalate verbal confrontations and use non-physical methods for managing behavior to avoid using restraints in most cases.

'Restraints are only used when there is a serious risk of injury to patients, employees or others and less restrictive methods have been tried without success,” McCoy said.

The Independence institute is expected to grow by about 30 adult beds later this year if Branstad succeeds in closing other institutions in Mount Pleasant and Clarinda. Patients at those facilities would go to institutes in Independence and Cherokee, or to private programs.