Faith Myers

Alaska is one of the few states that has not written a state grievance law to protect all psychiatric patients in locked facilities or units.

There must be a permanent independent advisory committee to the Legislature that makes recommendations on the standard of patient care.

The rights of people in locked psychiatric facilities have not improved significantly over the last 60 years.

People with a mental illness appear to be a forgotten and unprotected class in Alaska.

The heavy concentration on patient rights at API alone is not sufficient.

In many ways, large acute care psychiatric facilities operate in secret from the Alaska Legislature and the general public, even the ones financially supported by the state.

Alaska went from the early 1960s, when psychiatric patients were locked up indefinitely, to today, where psychiatric patients are often dumped on the streets.

By any measurement, psychiatric patients are not well protected by the state.

More than 25% of API’s patients are so unsatisfied they file grievances.

In my opinion, the state has chosen not to protect all disabled psychiatric patients in the grievance process to save money.

A significant obstacle to ensuring adequate patient care is the absence of a viable independent process for patient grievances.

The state of Alaska is turning disabled psychiatric patients over to private facilities with insufficient state oversight.

People experiencing long-term homelessness or a mental illness are often interconnected.

Alaska could reduce unnecessary trauma to psychiatric patients during treatment and transportation, but someone in power has to take the lead.

Alaska is still too often warehousing people with a mental illness or leaving them on the streets.