Lancaster General Hospital to open Behavioral Health Crisis Walk-in Center in January [update] | Health

This story has been updated to include additional information.

Rapid assessment, counseling, medication management and connections to related resources will be available starting in January 2025 at Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health’s new Behavioral Health Crisis Walk-in Center.

Plans for the downtown Lancaster city center, which will be located in Lancaster General Hospital at 555 N. Duke St. and accessed from North Lime Street, were announced this morning.

Open to people ages 6 and up who do not need inpatient or emergency treatment, the $1.6 million, 3,000-square-foot center will provide care for conditions such as anxiety, depression and substance use disorder, LG Health said. The center is anticipated to open around Jan. 21, 2025, said executive director of behavioral health at LG Health Tracey Lavallias.

“Patients across our entire health system as a result of this … across the entire county as a result of this, are going to be able to be kept safer, they’re going to be able to get treatment faster and as importantly, we’re going to provide assistance to their families,” LG Health CEO John Herman said today in announcing the center.

The center will be located in a space that had been used for patient care during a renovation and expansion of the hospital’s emergency department.

Construction is underway, according to LG Health spokesperson John Lines. When the center is open, patients will park in the garage and walk into the center, Lines said, which will be set back a bit within the garage.

The center will act as a bridge to other mental health services and aims to reduce demand on the emergency department, Lavallias said. The center will be open during times when demand for the hospital’s behavioral health services has been highest, Lavallias said.

Planned hours for the center are 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. on weekdays and 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. on weekends.

Of the behavioral health patients who come into the Lancaster General Hospital emergency department, 60% are low risk and get discharged, Lavallias said. These patients don’t need inpatient hospitalization, instead requiring other services.

The center will be a “relaxed, living room-style setting,” Lavallias said. Patients will be greeted by certified peer specialists, and will receive assessments to determine their risk level. High risk patients will be sent to the emergency department, while low risk patients can receive counseling onsite or be transferred to outpatient therapy or partial hospitalization programs, Lavallias said. The center will provide food, as well as space for homeless patients to store their belongings, he said.

The center will treat an estimated 4,000 people in person, and 6,000 via phone calls and telehealth in its first year, Lavallias said, patients who in the past would have been seen in emergency departments across Lancaster County. The center will create 13 new positions, which will be filled by new and existing employees, Lines said. Recruitment is ongoing.

The center is a partnership between LG Health and Capital Area Behavioral Health Collaborative, said the collaborative’s CEO Scott Suhring. The collaborative, Lancaster County Behavioral Health & Developmental Services and other stakeholders chose LG Health for the project, Suhring said. The collaborative requested proposals for a crisis walk-in center from LG Health and other providers, and LG Health was chosen for the project, Lavallias said.

The collaborative is a nonprofit that was founded by county commissioners from Lancaster, Cumberland, Dauphin, Lebanon and Perry counties, LG Health said, created to administer the HealthChoices Behavioral Health program. HealthChoices is a program that provides medical assistance in Pennsylvania, according to the Lancaster County Behavioral Health & Developmental Services website.

The collaborative provided $3.75 million in Medicaid reinvestment funds to LG Health for the project, dollars which will cover construction, equipment and operation of the center, LG Health said.

The funds not used for renovation, furniture and equipment costs will allow the center to break even for around three years, Lavallias said, and commercial insurance contracting will be pursued to maintain that status after those years.

The High Foundation donated $25,000 to the project, Lavallias said.