Western State Hospital

For the first time in its 40-year history, the Washington Department of Corrections (DOC) will be led by a woman. On Thursday, Gov. Jay Inslee named Cheryl Strange as the agency’s next secretary.

COVID-19 has hit at least 158 hospital workers since March, which takes them off the schedule and means a lot of overtime for the workers left on the wards. At least 64 patients have tested positive and one has died. Making matters worse, the economic downturn that resulted from the pandemic, and the loss of revenues needed to run state government s forcing the Department of Social and Health Services to make budget cuts, including layoffs.

To date, 22 Western State Hospital (WSH) staff have tested positive for the virus. That number has more than quadrupled in two weeks. In addition, six patients have tested positive and one elderly patient has died. Claudio said with each additional positive case, her fear rises.

The best available science suggests that people should maintain at least six feet of distance from others to avoid contracting COVID-19 – which is believed to be spread through droplets. But practicing safe distancing is often a challenge in congregate living settings.

Nearly a year-and-a-half after a series of vicious patient-on-staff attacks, including one that cost a nurse part of her ear, Western State Hospital is poised to open a new unit to treat its 10 most violence-prone patients.

Not only are these patients being hospitalized unnecessarily, they’re taking up beds needed by other patients. As of Sept. 6, the state said there were 19 patients waiting for a bed at Western and Eastern State Hospitals.

In recent months, court commissioners on both sides of the Cascades have found the state of Washington in contempt, and even imposed fines, over access to state psychiatric care for people with severe developmental disabilities. The cases involve people who’ve been found to pose an imminent risk to themselves or others, but are languishing in local hospitals.

A federal judge is set to hear arguments Portland this week from mental health advocates who say the state is failing dozens of criminal defendants in need of treatment.

Some psychiatric patients are spending not just hours in the emergency room, but days or a week. They're living there in the ER because there is nowhere else to send them. Northwest policymakers are now making it a priority to create more treatment capacity for people in mental health and addiction crises.

The enforcement action this week by the Washington Department of Labor and Industries follows a months-long investigation triggered by three violent patient-on-nurse assaults last year at Western State Hospital in Lakewood.