Mental patient decides to remain in N.Y.

By Mike Gordon
Advertiser Staff Writer

A New York mental health patient whose planned move to Hawai'i irked state health officials has decided that he doesn't want to come after all.

But the New York agency handling his treatment also said mental health officials here got the story wrong and yesterday insisted that it had never planned to give the patient a one-way plane ticket to Hawai'i.

Al Miller, chief executive officer for Federation Employment Guidance Service, said the patient decided Tuesday to remain in the residential treatment program run by his organization.

Miller said the man's decision had nothing to do with concern raised earlier this week by Hawai'i health officials — including state health director Bruce Anderson — who said it was inappropriate for a treatment facility to send a patient to another state.

"We have been working on him to stay," Miller said yesterday. "Whether it is permanent, I don't know. I think it is a lot better for him than going to Hawai'i — or anywhere else."

The patient had been in treatment in Hawai'i several years ago and had no family or friends here, Miller said. When the patient said he wanted to return to Hawai'i, his caseworkers never thought he would make the trip, but they arranged for the O'ahu-based support group United Self-Help to meet him at the airport.

"We didn't want him to land in Hawai'i and end up just wandering around," Miller said. "We were just taking a precaution in case he just disappeared and went there."

No one at Federation Employment Guidance Service, a private nonprofit organization that provides health and human services for 200,000 individuals a year, would ever have approved the purchase of a plane ticket, Miller said.

He said statements that the nonprofit organization paid for the ticket are untrue. "We don't believe in dumping patients," Miller said.

But United Self-Help stands by its version of the story, said Bud Bowles, the group's executive director. His assistant, Tracie Kam, who spoke directly with the patient's New York caseworker last week, has said several times that she was specifically told by the caseworker that the nonprofit organization would pay for the ticket.

Bowles said the patient's decision is for the best. If the man came here, he would have been housed at the Institute for Human Services because he had no friends or family in the state.

Staying in New York means the patient will be closer to doctors and counselors who know his medical treatment needs, Bowles said.

"They know his history," Bowles said. "They know his medication. Here he would have the stress of the trip and being homeless. And he would have to go to the end of the line."

Anderson said he was pleased to hear the patient was staying in New York.

"I don't know if we will ever be able to sort out who bought the ticket," he said. "But if nothing else, this brought out a potential problem and the need to be sure that patients aren't being dumped from one state to another."

Health department officials have been in contact with the New York commissioner for mental health and expressed concerns about the case.

On the Mainland, moving patients to another city or state is called "Greyhounding" — putting patients on a bus and sending them off — Anderson said. No one has ever proven that a patient has been sent to Hawai'i, although officials have long suspected it is a common occurrence.

"This puts people on notice that the state of Hawai'i will not tolerate this," Anderson said.

Reach Mike Gordon at mgordon@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8012.