INDIANAPOLIS — A Lawrence mental health facility facing multiple lawsuits by former patients will soon close its doors for good.
Options Behavioral Health is a licensed mental health institution located on Caito Drive.
WRTV Investigates has spent months speaking with former patients, their families, and asking questions about the facility.
Its parent company, Acadia Healthcare, says Options Behavioral Health will cease operations on October 9, “following a careful and comprehensive review of the current landscape for the programs and services offered by our network of affiliated facilities.”
A spokesperson for Acadia also says three other facilities will also close. WRTV Investigates has asked Acadia where those other locations are, and we are waiting to hear back.
“Prior to closure, Options Behavioral Health will continue to work closely with parents, families and receiving facilities, providing direct care to make this transition as smooth and supportive as possible,” a spokesperson for Acadia wrote in an email to WRTV. “Our clinical teams will collaborate with state and local agencies, as well as national and community partners, to verify the best alternative facilities that can provide comparable behavioral care services to fit the specific needs of each patient whose treatment extends beyond Options Behavioral Health’s last operating day.”
More than a dozen lawsuits have been filed against Options Behavioral Health and/or its parent company by former patients and their families — some alleging they were held against their will and that the facility is run “like a prison.”
All of the lawsuits are still pending.
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Indianapolis law firm CohenMalad LLP says their clients’ lawsuits reflect broader system issues within Acadia Healthcare including:
- Drugging patients into submission
- Admitting patients even though they do not meet the criteria for treatment
- Forcing patients to stay beyond their discharge dates
- Threatening patients with Involuntary Detention Orders if they request to leave
- Not offering the promised or minimally required treatment
- Holding patients to maximize reimbursement
Parents of a minor, identified by initials A.D., filed a lawsuit in Marion County on March 10.
A.D.’s lawsuit alleges the child was held against her will, and when her mother tried to have her daughter discharged, she was told insurance wouldn’t pay for the stay and she would have to pay out of pocket, read the complaint.
The lawsuit also alleges A.D. and fellow patients received brief “therapy” sessions during which they were asked if they watched pornography and other sexually explicit questions.
“Options administered medication to A.D. which were unnecessary and unindicated and served no medical or psychological benefit,” read the lawsuit. “Rather, the medications only put A.D. in a foggy and sedated state.”
As we reported in October, father Craig Inman filed a lawsuit on behalf of his daughter, who was 12 years old at the time she was a patient.
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"She was tortured and held hostage," said Craig Inman.
In a statement on the Acadia Healthcare website, the company says: “To be clear: we patently reject claims that Acadia places profits over patients - including inferences that we systematically hold patients longer than is medically necessary for financial reasons."
Acadia Healthcare also points out that their average length of stay at acute hospitals, like Options, is 9.3 days — in line with national averages.
37 private mental health institutions are licensed by the Indiana Family and Social Services Administration’s Division of Mental Health and Addiction.
WRTV Investigates found getting public information about mental health hospitals in Indiana can be downright difficult.
FSSA may conduct annual inspections and investigate complaints, however, FSSA does not post inspection reports or summaries online as they do for childcare facilities.
In fact, if the public wants to view inspection reports for a mental health hospital, they have to request copies through a formal records request under the Indiana Access to Public Records Act.
It took WRTV Investigates four months to receive inspection reports for Options Behavioral Health. We requested them on July 15 and received two reports on November 13.
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