Linn County Mental Health Access Center looks to add withdrawal management program

CEDAR RAPIDS — The Linn County Mental Health Access Center is looking to expand its offerings to better serve those affected by substance abuse.

Director Erin Foster this week said the center is waiting for word on a state license needed to open its own withdrawal management program. The program would provide medical and psychological care for people experiencing symptoms of withdrawal.

When it opens, it will be the latest in a string of mental health and substance abuse crisis services offered at the center, 501 13th St. NW in Cedar Rapids, which this month celebrated its fourth anniversary.

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“We know that mental health conditions can either precede, increase during or come after substance abuse,” Foster said in a recent presentation to the Linn County Board of Supervisors. With the new program, “we want to look at truly holistic care instead of treating mental health and substance abuse as their own silos.”

The access center offers a sobering unit where intoxicated individuals can sober up in a safe and supervised environment. However, hospitalization can become necessary when withdrawal symptoms intensify.

Withdrawal refers to the physical and psychological symptoms a person experiences after abruptly stopping addictive substance use or significantly reducing substance intake. While uniformly unpleasant, the symptoms can vary in severity and length depending on the patient and the substance.

Foster said an in-house withdrawal management program would reduce — although not eliminate — the number of people requiring hospitalization by implementing additional protocols and staffing to allow for a higher level of care than what is currently available.

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“The point of this program is that we’ll actually be able to provide those services right there at the access center” instead of sending people to the hospital, Foster said. “We can be there to prevent those medical and psychological complications and then support the patient’s plans post-discharge.”

The center’s focus would be on individuals experiencing withdrawal from alcohol or opiates, Foster said. The program would be the first in the state to be attached to a mental health crisis center, as most withdrawal management programs are carried out by substance use-specific agencies.

The center must first receive the temporary license before it can begin offering the program’s two beds to patients via a scheduled intake process. Regulators would then revisit the center at the six-month mark to determine its eligibility for a full license.

The Iowa Department of Health and Human Services has not provided a clear answer on when a temporary license would be issued, however, citing regulatory backlogs, Foster said.

“We’ve reached out multiple times, but they just keep saying they’re backlogged,” Foster said. “We’ve asked ‘Does that mean next week? Does that mean next month? Does that mean next year?’ and we haven’t gotten any feedback.”

In the interim, Foster said the center already has hired a medical director to lead the program and begun to implement or prepare the necessary protocols and procedures required by the state.

Planning also is underway for ways to expand the program’s capacity after the six-month startup period, and center staff have been in ongoing conversations with area substance use intervention organizations to whom they intend to direct patients from the withdrawal management program.

After Foster’s update, Linn County Supervisor Ben Rogers applauded the work that center staff have done to get the project to this point after years of effort.

Rogers, who will resign from the board Tuesday to take another job, has been a key and vocal supporter for the mental health center, and he heralded the withdrawal management program as its latest success story.

“These are the kinds of services that can have a generational impact the likes of which we may never be able to measure or fully understand,” Rogers said. “The impact of getting treatment on demand, on time and that is appropriate to the individual no matter the crisis or circumstances, that’s a difference maker.”

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