That study was reviewing rates paid to mental health providers. But as part of a report earlier this year by WCSH-TV in Portland, Farwell said DHHS was conducting a study meant to improve the state’s mental health system over the long term.
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“Most seriously mentally ill people, if they are in a system, it’s the prison system, and many of them are homeless,” she said.Ī spokesperson for the Maine Department of Health and Human Services, Jackie Farwell, was not immediately available Thursday to comment on Scully’s criticism. She said there were many times when Lacher received treatment that improved his symptoms, but then it was withdrawn because he had made improvements. “He should be able to receive services when he’s in crisis - for an illness that is not a life choice but a condition he was born with.” “I feel it is a violation of my son’s rights to withhold treatment until he’s committed a crime or tried to kill himself,” she said. “The system responds to criminal activity, such as an observable threat to himself, an actual suicide attempt, or (a threat) to another person. “You pretty much have to criminalize your loved one to get them help,” Scully said. Scully said the mental health system has failed her son by not doing enough for him. “The autism makes him nonsocial, the schizophrenia makes him scared of people,” said Scully, who is the legal guardian for her son.
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He was later placed at the Dorothea Dix Psychiatric Center in Bangor but ran away after being taken outside for a walk. Lacher, who is schizophrenic and is on the autism spectrum, was previously at a group home in Norridgewock but walked away from there in November and was missing for a couple of days before being found in Waterville. The Morning Sentinel spoke with Scully for an understanding of one family’s struggle with a child contending with mental illness and with finding a continuum of care that serves the long-term health interests of that person.
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His mother, Tammy Lacher Scully, is critical of what she says is an inadequate mental health system in Maine that doesn’t properly serve those with severe cases of mental illness. Lacher, 37, is still missing after running from a Bangor psychiatric hospital on June 6. “When a person can’t receive the care and treatment they need for mental illness, particularly when they are in a crisis, I see that as a disability rights issue.” “I think (the mental health care system) is woefully inadequate, even criminally so,” she said.
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She continues to search the Bangor area for her son, Graham Lacher, and often is joined by several volunteers. Tammy Lacher Scully said this week that families are forced to “criminalize your loved one” to get them the help they need. “You pretty much have to criminalize your loved one to get them help," says Tammy Lacher Scully, the mother of Graham Lacher who went missing June 6 after running from a psychiatric hospital.Ī Belfast woman whose 37-year-old son remains missing after walking away from a Bangor psychiatric hospital on June 6 says the mental health system in Maine has failed her son and others.