Amid State Investigation, South Carolina Agency Proposes New Plan for Hospital Discharges

South Carolina Department of Mental Health officials have proposed a new plan that would require doctors at South Carolina State Hospital to "complete a checklist that clearly explains the behavioral history of all patients awaiting release" before discharging them, the AP/Charleston Post and Courier reports. According to Dr. Ric Jones, acting deputy director of clinical services for the department, the list would chronicle whether patients had a "violent episode" in the hospital -- "details" that the facility had recorded "in a less standardized way" in the past. The proposal would also establish a new team of professionals and consumer advocates to provide a "third level of review" for patients with "violent or aggressive histories," Dr. Jaime Condom, director of the hospital, said. The state Mental Health Commission will receive the proposal at a meeting June 5, and the plan "could be in place" by next week, Jones said. State mental health department officials proposed the plan to "ease public concern" about patient safety at the hospital, the AP/Post and Courier reports (AP/Charleston Post and Courier, 6/4). Last month, the State Law Enforcement Division launched an investigation into allegations that the hospital had released patients to meet budget cut demands, spurred by allegations by the hospital's chief psychologist, Dr. Jack Luadzers, that "rapists, murderers and other potentially dangerous patients were being prematurely released" (Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, 5/30).

A 'Total Lie'?
Mental health department Director George Gintoli announced a different review plan in May that "never took shape" (AP/Charleston Post and Courier, 6/4). According to the Columbia State, Gintoli announced on May 17 that department psychiatrist Dr. Charles Goldman would review "all potentially dangerous psychiatric patients to ensure they are not released from hospitalization prematurely," but last week Goldman said that he "never agreed to that role" and plans to retire from the agency in four weeks. Hoping to "quell public anxiety" over charges that the South Carolina State Hospital has released psychiatric patients -- some with "histories of rape and other types of violent behavior" -- to "empty" the facility and "meet budget cut demands," Gintoli told reporters that Goldman would "ensure the State Hospital team is doing the right thing" by discharging patients. Goldman said, however, "I have not agreed to review individual discharges" from the hospital, adding, "I knew it had been proposed, and I was not in agreement." Gintoli admitted last Thursday he had never discussed the issue with Goldman "directly," but spoke with Goldman's supervisor, Dr. James Scully, who "thought [Goldman] had signed on to the plan." He added, "I wouldn't go out at a press conference and make stuff up. It wasn't misleading. I didn't have a lot of time to work it through." Scully dismissed the misstatement as "simply a miscommunication," adding, "It's my fault." Gintoli, who has faced $40 million in budget cuts and a criminal investigation at South Carolina State Hospital only four months into his tenure, said that he "felt pressured to ease public concerns about the safety of patient discharges" when he issued the statement about Goldman. "We were getting a lot of media calls," he said. Last week, "under pressure" from a patient review committee, the department "backed off its goal" of discharging 100 patients from the hospital by June. The agency has released 52 patients in the past three months (Winiarski, Columbia State, 6/1).