Answering local needs

Since it began offering inpatient psychiatric care at its $224 million Children’s Pavilion last October, Children’s Hospital of The King’s Daughters has admitted 500 patients, according to Dr. Carl Petersen, chief of mental health services at CHKD.

One in five children are estimated to have a mental health condition, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“More recently, during the pandemic, we saw an uptick in that number, and it looks like it’s even closer to one in four now,” Petersen says. “And regrettably, we just simply did not have enough providers here in Hampton Roads to meet the needs of kids.”

Located on the same Norfolk campus as the main CHKD hospital, the 14-story Children’s Pavilion also offers outpatient mental health care, as well as a pediatric practice, sports medicine and laboratory and radiology services.

CHKD Health Systems has hired about 400 new employees to staff the Children’s Pavilion, according to Petersen. Currently the health system has 48 beds open for pediatric inpatient psychiatric care, he says. “It’s a real challenge to hire nurses and other pediatric mental health providers to fill the roles that we need them to fill to care for the children in inpatient services.”

CHKD is making progress, though. In 2019, the health system hired its second child-and-adolescent psychiatrist, according to Petersen. That number has now grown to 19 psychiatrists. He’s optimistic that CHKD will be able to find enough staff to open 60 beds for inpatient care by the end of the calendar year.

Susannah Uroskie, president of the board of directors of the National Alliance on Mental Illness in Coastal Virginia, says the mental health services being offered at the Children’s Pavilion are “very needed. We’re excited that it’s now available as an amazing resource in our community.”

In other regional health care developments, the folding of Eastern Virginia Medical School into Old Dominion University is moving toward its Jan. 1, 2024, integration deadline, according to Amber Lester Kennedy, assistant vice president of public relations at ODU. In September, the General Assembly approved $14 million to support startup costs for the initial integration and launch of the Eastern Virginia Health Sciences Center at ODU.

Meanwhile, Norfolk-based health care system Sentara Healthcare rebranded in May as Sentara Health to reflect an “enhanced focus on promoting the overall health and well-being” of its patients, members and communities. Sentara also announced that by the end of the year, it would retire its Optima Health and Virginia Premier insurance brands, which support nearly 750,000 total Medicaid members in Virginia, and instead will offer all plans under the Sentara Health Plans brand.

In October 2022, Bon Secours broke ground on the new Bon Secours Harbour View Hospital, which will serve northern Suffolk and western Hampton Roads. The 98,000-square-foot hospital will adjoin the existing Bon Secours Health Center at Harbour View and is scheduled to open in 2025.

Additionally, Chesapeake Regional Medical Center expects to begin performing open-heart surgeries in early 2024. In January, Dr. Colin Greene, then the state health commissioner, approved the center’s application to introduce open-heart surgery at the hospital. Five years earlier, the center’s initial request was denied by a former state health commissioner. The Supreme Court of Virginia ruled in 2022 that the commissioner had erred in the denial, and Chesapeake Regional Medical Center applied again, this time successfully.

In late July, Riverside Health System officials broke ground for the Riverside Smithfield Hospital, a 50-bed acute care facility planned for Isle of Wight County. Riverside plans to open the hospital in early 2026.