Oklahoma’s first comprehensive pediatric behavioral health center integrated with a children’s hospital is expected to begin serving patients in December. Oklahoma Children’s OU Health celebrated the facility’s grand opening Wednesday, ushering in a new era of whole-person healthcare that’s closer to home.
Oklahoma Children’s OU Health Behavioral Health Center in Oklahoma City will provide comprehensive inpatient and outpatient behavioral health services, crisis stabilization, therapy, specialized psychiatric care and support services designed for children, adolescents and families.
It will feature 72 inpatient beds, including six for children on the autism spectrum, 12 for children ages five to 12 and 54 for those ages 12 to 17. Patient rooms were designed to accommodate a parent or caregiver overnight, allowing families to remain involved in care.
Currently, many families must travel outside Oklahoma to states like Arkansas or Texas to access this level of specialized care. Tracy Cothran, president of children’s services at Oklahoma Children's OU Health, said the hospital often receives patients with complex behavioral health needs in its emergency department. That need is growing.
Ten years ago, she said children would rarely experience a behavioral health crisis in the hospital’s emergency department. Now, Cothran said the hospital sees multiple children every shift.
Carrie Blumert, CEO of Mental Health Association Oklahoma, said most emergency rooms are not equipped with sufficient personnel and infrastructure to handle children’s behavioral health needs. A 2023 policy statement from three national healthcare organizations said families often have nowhere else to turn, increasing the likelihood of lengthy wait times and crowded facilities.
Blumert said she’s seen families face this dilemma. Last week, a friend who works at a nonprofit texted her about a client with a young son who needed treatment. They didn’t know where to send him.
“When this facility opens up, I will say, ‘You should send him to OU Health,’” Blumert said.
Specialized outpatient offerings will include partial hospitalization, intensive outpatient and disordered eating and feeding programs.
Dr. Rasim Somer Diler, clinical service chief of psychiatry and behavioral health at OU Health, said at the center, patient transitions between service levels will only be an elevator ride away.
“When people are being discharged in other institutions, then sometimes they have to find their own provider, therapy, medication management, and they don't get prior authorization to continue their medication. It all then turns into higher rates of readmission within the 30 days and also higher rates of suicide attempts,” Diler said. “That's why we try to design the services, not to just help them heal while they're in our hospital, but to help them to continue to grow after getting discharged.”
The center will also offer interdisciplinary therapeutic services, including music, art, physical and occupational therapy, and speech-language pathology. Patients will benefit from therapeutic spaces like a two-story gymnasium and multiple outdoor healing areas.
The center will open Dec. 7 using a phased approach, Cothran said, meaning it will be ready to receive up to 24 patients at first. Cothran said the facility could be full within 90 to 120 days, depending on patient experiences and outcomes.
“We do not make decisions without patient and staff safety being the cornerstone of those decisions,” Cothran said. “We will continually evaluate and improve those workflows to ensure that we're ready for a greater population.”
How did the center get started?
Officials broke ground on the center in November 2023. The $140 million project has received support from the Oklahoma legislature, the University Hospitals Authority & Trust and donors.
Several state lawmakers attended the Wednesday grand opening, including House Speaker Kyle Hilbert, R-Bristow, and Senate Health and Human Services Committee Chair Paul Rosino, R-Oklahoma City.
Hilbert said this issue became personal to him when a constituent called about his 17-year-old granddaughter, saying she needed long-term inpatient care and couldn’t get in anywhere. He spent months calling around and couldn’t find a solution. To this day, Hilbert said it is one of his most frustrating constituent cases.
So, when the University of Oklahoma’s government affairs team presented a proposal for the pediatric behavioral health center, Hilbert was fully on board. In fact, he told them they weren’t asking for enough money.
“Having this campus right here in the heart of Oklahoma City, right in the center of Oklahoma, that can meet the holistic needs of all Oklahomans could not be more important than it is today,” Hilbert said.
“When I think about where we are as a country, and the fact of the challenges that children are facing today that they weren't facing 20 years ago. As a father of three daughters, what Instagram and social media is doing to young girls; it terrifies me. And we at the state Capitol, we've taken some actions to make that better. But we have more work to do, and we need your help.”
The Oklahoma Children’s OU Health Behavioral Health Center needed to hire for 405 new clinical and non-clinical jobs. Several partnerships were formed to meet this goal, including a new registered behavioral health technician program through Metro Tech and teacher recruitment with Oklahoma City Public Schools.
OU Health President and CEO Jonathan Curtright said the facility is fully staffed.
The center also aims to strengthen the state’s behavioral health workforce through clinical training opportunities. Blumert from Mental Health Association Oklahoma said the facility is a much-needed asset for Oklahoma’s workforce.
“Oftentimes in behavioral health, you hear providers – whether it's nurses, physicians, case managers – who have to work in really old, rundown buildings, old psych wards, the old wing of the hospital that's been turned into a behavioral health side of the hospital,” Blumert said. “We just haven't invested in behavioral healthcare the way we have cancer care or heart care. To have a beautiful facility like this, where people want to come to work, is really special.”
Dr. Diler from OU Health said he spent many years at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Western Psychiatric Hospital, where he founded and served as medical director of the nation's first inpatient pediatric bipolar disorder unit. One of the factors that brought him to Oklahoma was this new center, he said.
“I am deeply grateful to everyone who believed in this vision, invested in it, and helped bring it to life,” Diler said. “Together, we have created something exceptional. More importantly, together we have created hope.”
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