Acute Partial Hospital

This program addresses the needs of children and adolescents who are experiencing severe disruptions in their day to day routine as a result of a diagnosed psychiatric disorder(s).

We have designed the program to serve children and adolescents that are in need of a high level of structure and are not able to be maintained in a traditional outpatient care setting, but who are not showing the level of acuity that would necessitate inpatient treatment.

This is a time-limited intensive treatment program that offers structured, coordinated, developmentally focused clinical services in a stable and therapeutic environment. Prevention or stepdown from inpatient hospitalization is often indicated and an average length of stay is two to three weeks, but can vary depending on the child’s need. Children and adolescents require evaluation, planning, treatment and disposition within a moderately brief period of time.

The primary goal of our program is to provide symptom stabilization and allow the child to return to less restrictive levels of care.

Our objectives are:

• To divert children and adolescents from avoidable acute psychiatric inpatient hospitalizations
• To provide intensive transitional treatment following inpatient hospitalization.
• To provide an alternative for a more intensive treatment program than what is offered by traditional outpatient services.
• To provide a therapeutic setting for a comprehensive evaluation.
• To provide psychiatric and medication management/intervention
• To facilitate community adjustment following inpatient hospitalization.

The Pennsylvania Department of Public Welfare licenses the partial hospital program of Wesley. The program operates Monday through Friday 8am-4pm. Therapists are available evening hours for family meetings. Crisis intervention is provided through an on-call system 24 hours per day.

We also offer a gym and outdoor playground and fields provide ideal environments for therapeutic activities and adventure based programming at our site.

Our daily staffing consists of Board Certified Child and Adolescent Psychiatrists, Psychiatric Nurses, Clinical and Education Supervisors, Mental Health Therapists, Teachers, and an Intake department. We have a staff to client ratio of 1:4 in this program.

We believe that family involvement is integral to the treatment process. Weekly family therapy, involvement in follow-up care planning, and emergency staff phone contact during non-program hours are just some of the services we make available to all families.