July 14th, 2008

The planned closure of a Wilkes-Barre adolescent psychiatric ward could result in a lack of beds for children’s inpatient psychiatric treatment in northeastern Pennsylvania.

The Times-Tribune reports that Geisigner South Wilkes-Barre has announced plans to close its children’s psychiatric ward in September.  The hospital currently has 10 beds for mentally ill children.

Because of this closure, First Hospital of Wyoming Valley will be the only hospital in northeastern Pennsylvania to offer inpatient psychiatric care for children.  First Hospital currently has 30 beds for patients under the age of 18.

The lack of beds may result in some patients having to travel as far as Philadelphia to receive treatment when the beds at First Hospital are full.

First Hospital CEO Joe Knecht says the hospital plans to add beds to its adolescent psychiatric ward to make up for the loss of beds at Geisigner South Wilkes-Barre.