OPINION: Psychiatric patients’ complaints must help shape Alaska mental health care

Successful businesses respond to customer complaints. It is not the same with locked psychiatric facilities in Alaska. I estimate that over 600 psychiatric patient complaints annually go to what I consider a black hole and never significantly alter mental health care at a policy or Legislative level.

Last Nov. 17, Sen. Matt Claman chaired a hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee. The subject: the House Bill 172 report to the Legislature on how to improve psychiatric patient rights, care, and outcomes. The video is available online.

The presenters of the House Bill 172 report were predominantly providers of psychiatric services: The Department of Family and Community Services, the Department of Health, the Alaska Mental Health Trust Authority and Agnew Beck.

At the beginning of the presentation, the presenters announced that they do not know how many people rotate in and out of locked psychiatric facilities or units each year for a forced evaluation or treatment. And they do not have statistics on how many psychiatric patients are injured each year during treatment or transportation, or the number and type of patients’ complaints and traumatic events experienced by patients. The question must be asked: How can state agencies or the Legislature make improvements in care for people they know little or nothing about?

The presenters announced that 12 psychiatric facilities that receive direct funding from the state or grant money were visited to write the $285,346 report. None of the facilities had the same patient grievance and appeal process. States with best practices have created a standardized grievance and appeal process for patients in locked psychiatric facilities and units. The impartial body required in state law AS47.30.847 was not the same in all facilities. And only 12 people with lived experience of the mental health system were interviewed.

The report states that state laws and regulations are being followed in all 12 psychiatric facilities that were visited. But in a later paragraph, it is pointed out that only one psychiatric facility has written a policy to comply with the gender choice of staff for intimate care law AS18.20.095.

The report required by House Bill 172 also states that former psychiatric patients could not remember being explained their rights. The speakers at the hearing stated it was because mental illness prevented patients from remembering. The hospitals were given no responsibility for patients not understanding patient rights and suggested no changes. In my opinion, the state should have a standard way of informing psychiatric patients of their rights in law or regulations.

Psychiatric patients have a right by state law AS47.30.847 to bring their grievances to an impartial body. On February 9th, 2024, Matt Davidson, Special Assistant to the Commissioner at the Department of Family and Community Services, responded to a request for information. “How many patients at API in 2022 brought a grievance to an impartial body?” The number Davidson gave was zero. The number zero is only understandable after realizing that managers of psychiatric facilities have been put in charge of writing the impartial body policy.

From the middle of 2005 to the middle of 2006, there were 256 patient complaints at the Alaska Psychiatric Institute, including sexual abuse allegations. Not a single patient was able to bring their grievance to an impartial body. It has been my experience that psychiatric hospitals like API do not faithfully follow the law. There is no state agency with the authority to ensure that psychiatric patients are given all their statutory rights.

The Department of Family and Community Services is a provider of psychiatric services. They run API. Their budget runs into the tens of millions. They have made it clear in reports and testimony that they do not want to gather and share statewide statistics of psychiatric complaints, injuries and traumatic events that happen in locked psychiatric facilities. Without those statistics, the general public and the Legislature cannot make good mental health care or policy decisions.

Alaska Statute 47.30.847 lets managers of psychiatric facilities write the patient grievance procedure. The most damage the Legislature can do to a psychiatric patient’s recovery is to continue to let managers of locked psychiatric facilities like API set standards of patient rights and care. The recent white paper I co-authored to address the issues for the HB172 report is a comprehensive prescription for what should be done. It is available at https://psychrights.org/whitepaper.pdf.

The Legislature in 2024 must overhaul psychiatric patient rights with a goal that was envisioned at API in the 1960s, and that was to create a real partnership between locked psychiatric facilities and patients in those facilities.

Faith J. Myers is the author of the book, “Going Crazy in Alaska,” and has spent more than seven months in locked psychiatric facilities or units.

The views expressed here are the writer’s and are not necessarily endorsed by the Anchorage Daily News, which welcomes a broad range of viewpoints. To submit a piece for consideration, email commentary(at)adn.com. Send submissions shorter than 200 words to letters@adn.com or click here to submit via any web browser. Read our full guidelines for letters and commentaries here.