$23 Million Mental Health Center Going Up on Court Street

April 21, 2006 --

A state-run mental health facility is undergoing an upgrade in the Memphis area, with a new Memphis Mental Health Institute being built at 951 Court St.

Turner Universal Construction Co. is building the $23 million facility, which is slated to be completed by summer or fall 2007.

The Tennessee Department of Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities operates regional mental health institutes in Knoxville, Chattanooga, Nashville, Bolivar and Memphis.

The new facility will replace the current mental health institute at 865 Poplar Ave., a 98-bed building constructed in 1962 as the Tennessee Psychiatric Hospital and Institute.

Tennessee's state-run psychiatric hospitals were renamed as mental health institutes in 1977.

The old facilty, which will remain open until the new one is completed, provides care for patients with severe and persistent mental illnesses or substance abuse disorders. Some are referred by courts to be tested for competency to stand trial, their mental status at the time of alleged criminal offenses and the need to be committed.

Treatment options

Memphis architects from The Ritchie Organization, a 200-person architectural, planning, engineering and interior design firm headquartered in Boston, are designing the three-story, 104,000-square-foot acute care facility.

The new 75-bed building will have a four-pronged shape, similar to clover leaves.

The center portion of each floor will be a nursing station. Three of the corridors radiating from the center will have in-patient beds. The fourth leg will have support space for the staff offices and group therapy room.

The new mental health institute is designed to be repetitive so the staff can work in any of the three identical in-patient nursing units and find everything the same, said David Rhodes, vice president of TRO and the principal architect in charge of the facility's design.

The building also will have a learning and treatment center in which group therapy and dining will take place. After patients get out of their beds in the nursing units each morning, staff will be able to work with them in the treatment areas.

"It's not something where they can go and be in bed all day long," Rhodes said. "It's a very aggressive treatment program."

Outpatient structure

The new institute is not designed for long-term patients.

"The idea is to return the people to the community or an outpatient setting as soon as possible," Rhodes said.

The original Memphis Mental Health Institute was built to accommodate a variety of patients when lengths of stay were much longer. After the new facility is built, patients with more severe conditions who require a longer stay will be transferred to the Western Mental Health Institute in Bolivar, Tenn.

One challenge with the new building was how to fit it on the current site. While the Middle Tennessee Mental Health Institute in Nashville stands one story and is spread out among 255,000 square feet, TRO had to design the Memphis facility as a three-story building that still would have what was needed. The Nashville facility has a 300-bed capacity and cost $30 million to construct.

The current Memphis Mental Health Institute, which has around 100 beds, sits on a 6.1-acre site and was bought from the state by Methodist Healthcare for around $12.5 million.

Jill Hudson, communications director for the Tennessee Department of Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities, refused to comment on the new facility. Calls to Memphis Mental Health Institute director Larry Ventura were not returned by press time.

Easy access to The Med

The University of Tennessee's Dobbs Building was torn down to make room for the new mental health institute, which will be connected to the Regional Medical Center at Memphis. This will allow for easier access to clinical services at The Med such as lab work and radiology.

"If they don't have to have it inside the mental hospital, they can take the patient to The Med," Rhodes said. "So potentially, you could have a really good quality of clinical service to support the mental health service."

The Med also has a psychiatric emergency department.

In the past, patients would have been driven to The Med from the existing mental health institute.

"Now this can all happen internally," Rhodes said. "I think it's a very successful project for everyone concerned."

Methodist bought the old mental health institute site to expand the Le Bonheur campus, which is adjacent to it.

The Le Bonheur Children's Medical Center expansion will cost approximately $235 million and will grow the current hospital facility to almost 1 million square feet.

The new hospital will have 12 floors and 650,000 square feet. It currently is designed for 230 beds along with dedicated units for pediatric, cardiovascular and neonatal intensive care.

It also could feature a 14-room surgical suite, a three-room catheterization and radiology suite and a four-room endoscopy suite.

After the addition is finished, the eastern two-thirds of the existing hospital will be demolished to clear space for a 400-car parking garage, a new entry boulevard and a site for future expansion.

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"The idea is to return (patients) to the community or an outpatient setting as soon as possible."

- David Rhodes

Vice president of The Ritchie Organization and the principal architect in charge of designing the new Memphis Mental Health Institute, on the facility's design rationale