New UTHealth Houston hospital set to open in March |
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Written by: Deborah Lake, UTHealth Houston
A new academic psychiatric hospital, part of the John S. Dunn Behavioral Sciences Center, will combine the most advanced patient care, research, and education when it opens next month at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth Houston) in partnership with the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC) and the Texas Medical Center.
A ribbon-cutting was held on Wednesday, February 2. Patient services will begin in March.
The 253,000 square-foot facility, which includes 264 new inpatient beds, was funded by the 85th Texas Legislative Session in 2017. The first years of the hospital’s operational funding were approved by the 87th Legislature in 2021. The hospital building carries the name of the John S. Dunn Behavioral Sciences Center in gratitude for a generous gift from the Dunn Foundation to bolster the university’s behavioral health initiatives and address significant gaps in mental health care services.
“We are truly grateful to our state leaders and legislators, our partners at HHSC, and the Dunn Foundation for their shared vision and transformative investment in behavioral health,” said UTHealth Houston President Giuseppe Colasurdo, MD. “This center is an integral part of our collaborative, comprehensive effort to ensure that everyone in our community has access to the very best in mental health services."
The new academic psychiatric hospital and the nearby UTHealth Houston Harris County Psychiatric Center combine to create the UTHealth Houston Behavioral Sciences Campus and the largest academic psychiatric hospital in the country with 538 beds.
“Increasing access to mental and behavioral health care has long been a priority for Governor Abbott,” said Texas First Lady Cecilia Abbott. “The State of Texas is proud to invest in resources, like the new UTHealth Houston Dunn Behavioral Sciences Center, that will ensure Texans receive the best care available and help us better address mental and behavioral health challenges.”
The additional beds will allow UTHealth Houston to reach out to a larger region as part of its contract with HHSC, serving 29 contiguous counties spreading out from Houston. It is the first public psychiatric hospital to be built in the state in 25 years.
“This new state-of-the-art facility is a much-needed investment in the community and it will have a long-lasting impact in our ability to provide care for the most vulnerable Texans living with serious mental illness,” said Texas HHSC Executive Commissioner Cecile Erwin Young.
The facility accommodates multiple patient populations and levels of treatment with access to medication management, group and individual therapy, and educational and life skills training.
“This new academic psychiatric facility will help us expand our efforts to serve our community and alleviate suffering from major mental illnesses by leveraging cutting-edge research, patient care, and education around mental health,” said Jair Soares, MD, PhD, the Pat R. Rutherford, Jr. Chair In Psychiatry at McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston and executive director of the new hospital.
“This new facility will allow us to create a more complete continuum of care by providing step-down beds for those patients who need more time in the hospital than a typical acute care stay provides,” said Stephen Glazier, FACHE, COO of the new hospital. “We will also partner with our local mental health authority, the Harris Center, to provide a housing component to our continuum with the new supported housing units they have recently opened. By providing a complete and integrated continuum of care, we expect to get much better outcomes for our patients.”
Results of two small, recently published studies led by Alia Warner, PhD, assistant professor; and Scott Lane, PhD, professor and vice chair for research in the Faillace Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston, revealed that longer stays for select first or early onset of psychosis patients in a step-down setting resulted in lower hospital readmission rates and a lower likelihood of conviction of at least one crime post-discharge.
The new facility, built by Vaughn Construction, includes support space for staff and student education and research, and a multi-use therapy mall. The architecture, interior design and landscape architecture was designed by Perkins&Will to promote a healing atmosphere.
Two internal courtyards allow access to the outdoors with walking paths, seating areas, and gardens. Wall-sized murals, which include photographs of Greater Houston and Texas landmarks and landscapes, were commission specifically for the hospital. The cafeteria includes a wall of inspirational sayings about nutrition.
Natural light from large windows, noise-reducing materials, and lighting were designed to lower stress. Each unit also has a group room used for therapy sessions, art and music therapy, and recreation and relaxing. Rooms include chalkboards for a creative outlet for patients.
A large space on the fourth level for inpatient and outpatient services for people suffering from treatment-resistant behavioral health disorders has been designed with natural light and a Galveston scene mural.
One wing of the new building contains space for teaching and training new clinicians including doctors, nurses, therapists, and researchers.
“The new hospital building improves access to inpatient psychiatric care for our community,” said Lokesh Shahani, MD, MPH, associate professor in the Faillace Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and chief medical officer of the new hospital. “It provides us an opportunity to develop innovative and personalized ways of caring for individuals suffering with mental illness.”
Special Appreciation
Many people at the Texas State Capitol and across the state were instrumental in securing the construction funds, including the author and sponsor of SB 1, Sen. Jane Nelson and Rep. John Zerwas, MD, now executive vice chancellor of Health Affairs for The University of Texas System, and state leaders Gov. Greg Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and former House Speaker Joe Straus. Sen. Charles Schwertner, MD, and former Rep. Sarah Davis, who oversaw budget negotiations for health and human service programs, led the effort in their respective chambers to make sure funding was included. Other members of the Harris County delegation were vocal in their support.
The new building was also a recommended project by two interim committees before the session. After a long study, tours and briefings, the Houston project was recommended for this behavioral health funding by the Senate Interim Committee on Health and Human Services, led by Sen. Schwertner and vice chaired by Sen. Lois Kolkhorst; and the House Select Committee on Mental Health, which was led by Rep. Four Price and included local Houston mental health champions Rep. Garnet Coleman and Rep. Senfronia Thompson.
In addition to statewide leadership from Gov. Abbott, Lieutenant Gov. Dan Patrick, and Speaker Dade Phelan, legislators who were key to operational funding of these beds during the 87th Legislature were SB 1 and HB 2 author/sponsor Sen. Nelson and Rep. Greg Bonnen, MD. Additionally, the chief budget negotiators for the health and human service programs in conference committee were Sen. Lois Kolkhorst and Rep. Giovanni Capriglione assisted by Rep. Ann Johnson, a member of the House Health and Human Services Appropriations Subcommittee.
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Watch a video of the ribbon cutting |
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Check out these photos from the ribbon cutting |
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Jair Soares, MD, PhD
Photo by Jacob Power
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Louis A. Faillace, MD
Photo by Jacob Power
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Study lounge
Photo by Jacob Power
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Crowd presentation
Photo by Jacob Power
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Tour of the facility
Photo by Jacob Power
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Ribbon-cutting
Photo by Jacob Power
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Spotlight:
Rolanda Johnson's journey at UTHealth Houston
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Rolanda Johnson, program manager for UTHealth Houston Center for Neurobehavioral Research on Addiction, was featured in a spotlight for McGovern Medical School employees. She started at UTHealth Houston in 2003 and talks about her journey to becoming program manager.
Read the full interview here.
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Ugueto and Sanches inducted in MMS-AME |
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Ana Ugueto, PhD, assistant professor, and Marsal Sanches, MD, PhD, associate professor, from the Faillace Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences were recently inducted into the McGovern Medical School Academy of Master Educators (MMS-AME).
The MMS-AME serves to promote and enhance education and celebrates those who are passionate about teaching within McGovern Medical School. Membership to the MMS-AME is a two-step process.
Interested educators must obtain a letter of nomination by their chairperson or division director, which they submit along with a letter of intent and a current CV to the Academy. Following initial review by the Academy Selection Committee, faculty members are invited to submit an educational portfolio. The Educational Portfolio is composed of five sections: teaching and assessment, mentoring and advising, developing of enduring educational materials, educational leadership, and educational scholarship.
Both Ugueto and Sanches work extensively in education, specifically with psychiatry residents and fellows, psychology predoctoral interns, and medical students. Sanches is the director of the Research Track Residency Training Program, and has been extensively involved in clinical and research education for the past several years. Ugueto started teaching during graduate school, and currently serves as a clinical supervisor, a research mentor, and the director of psychology journal club.
Ugueto and Sanches are both proud to be a part of the MMS-AME and look forward to collaborating with AME members to have a positive impact on educational programming.
“The academy is made up of people who are focused on education,” Ugueto said. “We all come together for the common goal of improving education at all levels of the medical school.”
Read more about MMS-AME here.
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Arriola Vigo adds consultation-liaison certification |
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Jose Arriola Vigo, MD, MPH, assistant professor in the Faillace Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, recently became board certified in consultation-liaison psychiatry (previously known as psychosomatic medicine) by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology.
Becoming board certified means Arriola Vigo possesses the clinical skills necessary to provide expert psychiatric care for patients with complex medical conditions to inpatient and outpatient primary care and specialty services. He chose to specialize in consultation-liaison psychiatry because this overlaps with other specialties, specifically primary care, internal medicine, and surgical specialty fields.
In order to become board certified, the physician has to complete a one-year fellowship in the specialty and pass an exam.
Arriola Vigo’s background is working with medically complicated patients. Previously, he was a primary care physician in an underserved area of Peru. After becoming a psychiatrist, he wanted to pursue a path where medical care and mental health care intersected.
Working in a collaborative environment is an aspect that Arriola Vigo enjoys. One of his goals is to implement a psycho-oncology clinic in the outpatient center at Harris Health Lyndon B. Johnson Hospital using a collaborative care model, a well-known and effective model of care to treat medically complex patients. This would give him and his colleagues the ability to treat patients with mental health conditions who are simultaneously dealing with a cancer diagnosis or a terminal illness.
“It’s a good culmination of the primary goals that I had when I decided on a specialty in psychiatry,” Arriola Vigo said. “It was a feeling of accomplishment when I was notified that I passed the exam.”
Read more about Arriola Vigo’s background here.
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Research by Selveraj lab published in Molecular Psychiatry |
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Sudhakar Selvaraj and team
Photo by Aaron Nieto
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Written by: Roman Petrowski, Office of Communications, McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston
The research examines the contradictory results of various studies performed on multiple synaptic proteins involved in causing bipolar (BD) and major depressive disorders (MDD). MDD and BD affect nearly 20 percent of the population and are among the most prevalent mood disorders.
“MDD and BD are considered heterogeneous conditions with multiple underlying pathophysiological mechanism that include genetic, immune, synaptic, cellular stress and oxidative response pathways,” the authors said. “However, the exact pathophysiology of mood disorders is still not known but is likely multifactorial.”
Postmortem brain studies of BD and MDD patients have implicated synaptic disfunction leading to morphological and cellular changes in brain regions. These changes include reduced glial cell density and neuronal size in the prefrontal cortex, orbitofrontal cortex, amygdala, hippocampus, and anterior cingulate cortex, and show that synaptic function-related genes and synaptic function-related genes are decreased in patients with these disorders.
However, in various other postmortem studies in MDD and BD patients have shown discrepancies in comparison to other findings, including increases, decreases, and no change in synaptic proteins.
“Given these discrepancies, our primary goal in this review and meta-analysis is to systematically synthesize the evidence of alterations of synaptic proteins in MDD and BD and determine whether the alterations are localized in the brain regions,” the authors said. “We hypothesized that synaptic proteins and mRNAs would be reduced in frontal and limbic brain regions in both MDD and BD.”
Using a comprehensive search of several biomedical databases of more the 3,954 records, the group narrowed their search down to 24 unique studies for primary and secondary analyses. Of those studies, six studied SNAP-25 protein levels in BD, while eight studied synaptophysin protein levels in BD and six more studied synaptophysin protein levels in MDD.
The research focused around synaptophysin, proteins associated with the Snap Receptor (SNARE) complex, and the postsynaptic density protein 95 (PSD-95). According to the authors, proteins from the SNARE complex are necessary for vesicular docking and fusion with the presynaptic membrane, while PSD-95 is necessary for synaptic excitability.
“Given the importance of these proteins in synaptic communication, understanding the levels of these proteins in BD and MDD is important in understanding the pathophysiology of these mood disorders,” the authors said.”
The group’s finding were consistent with previous literature in finding that SNAP-25 protein levels present lower in patients with bipolar disorder and that no differences were round in the localization at certain brain regions. They also found that due to PSD-94’s critical role in stabilization of receptors and regulation of synaptic strength, a decrease in the protein could be a cause for dendritic spinal loss.
“To our knowledge, this is the first systematic review and metanalyses of synaptic protein studies in MDD and BD to evaluate the localization and levels of synaptic proteins and mRNAs in these mood disorders,” the authors said. “While exploratory, this analysis may guide further research and inquiry into these critical synaptic proteins.”
Read the full publication here.
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UTHealth Houston Update Conference is next month! |
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The Faillace Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences is proud to announce registration is open for the 2022 UTHealth Houston Psychiatry Update Conference, titled “Hot Topics: Child and Adolescent Psychiatry,” on Saturday, April 9, 2022.
Speakers at the conference will share the latest information and research on various topics in child psychiatry, including attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and other neurodevelopmental disorders such as Autism spectrum (ASD), mood and anxiety disorders, and a look at pediatric trauma research.
Cesar Soutullo, MD, PhD, course director of the conference, previews what will take place at the conference. Watch the video below
See the full list of speakers and registration information here.
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The following clinical trials are in operation, following all necessary safety guidelines. If you're interested, contact the appropriate study.
We are conducting a study to develop adaptive treatment interventions; that is, interventions that change based on how the participant is doing. Individuals seeking treatment for cocaine addiction may qualify to participate in this two-phase program.
Contact: 713-500-DRUG (3784)
This study aims to examine the safety and efficacy of allogenic mesenchymal stem cells as an adjunctive treatment of treatment-resistant bipolar depression. Patients will be assigned into a treatment or a placebo group.
Contact: 713-486-2627
This study assesses the safety and tolerability of Candesartan as an adjunctive treatment of bipolar depression. All patients will receive the study drug for four weeks and a placebo for four weeks. Neither the patients nor the study team will know if the patient received the study drug or the placebo first.
Contact: 713-486-2627
The UTHealth Houston Center of Excellence on Mood Disorders at the Faillace Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences is collaborating with LivaNova, a global medical technology company, to start a new clinical trial – the “RECOVER study” – to help treat depression.
Contact: 713-486-2627
To see all open studies, visit our website.
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Amit Kumar Madeshiya, Carl Whitehead, Ashutosh Tripathi, Anilkumar Pillai
Maja Skikic, Jose Alberto Arriola
Edison Leung, Ethan W. Lau, Andi Liang, Constanza de Dios, Robert Suchting, Linda Östlundh, Joseph C. Masdeu, Masahiro Fujita, Marsal Sanches, Jair C. Soares, Sudhakar Selvaraj
Kay T Pham, Amir Nabizadeh, Salih Selek
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Ron Acierno, PhD, talked to KPRC-TV Channel 2 about a new mental health program UTHealth Houston is offering to help law enforcement officers deal with trauma.
Lokesh Shahani, MD, spoke with Houston Chronicle regarding UTHealth Houston's new academic psychiatric hospital.
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Louis A. Faillace, MD, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at McGovern Medical School at UTHealth
713-486-2500
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