Plan to Transfer Patients Could Force Closure of State Hospital : Health care: Proposal to shut center for developmentally disabled would effectively put Camarillo site out of business by making treatment unaffordable, county officials warn.

A state report calling for the closure of Camarillo State Hospital’s developmental center may force the entire 59-year-old institution to shut down within a year or two, Ventura County mental health officials said Monday.

Transferring 492 developmentally disabled patients to other state centers could drive up treatment costs so much for the remaining mentally ill patients that counties no longer would be able to afford to send their patients there, said David Freehauf, the hospital’s executive director.

That would effectively put the hospital out of business because it would no longer generate enough revenue to meet its $95-million annual budget, Freehauf told a 10-member mental health advisory group.

The annual cost per mentally ill patient is now about $100,000--a figure that could double with the loss of disabled patients, officials said.

“From my vantage point, it looks very doubtful that we would be able” to stay open, he said. “It’s pretty clear to me that our customers are leaving and they are leaving rather rapidly.”

The problem, officials said, is that the number of patients admitted to state hospitals for psychiatric treatment has been steadily declining for at least five years.

Following nationwide trends, the mentally ill are increasingly receiving treatment in small community hospitals or in residential care centers, Freehauf said.

There has been a similar drop in the number of patients receiving care for disorders such as mental retardation at the state’s developmental centers, he said. The impact has been particularly severe at Camarillo State Hospital because the facility serves both types of patients, Freehauf said.

The hospital has 875 patients, down from 1,200 just three years ago, he said. And the decrease is expected to continue as the movement toward community-based care grows stronger, he said.

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In a draft report released Dec. 5, the state Department of Developmental Services recommended that Camarillo’s developmental center be closed by July 1997.

Camarillo State Hospital is targeted as part of a statewide cost-cutting program because it has the state’s smallest developmentally disabled population, the report says. At the same time, its fixed costs per resident are the highest for all developmental centers in the state.

More than half of the state hospital’s patients come from outside Ventura County and have a good possibility of being returned to programs in their home communities, the report says.

The state Department of Mental Health is looking at other options for Camarillo, including transforming it into a high-security treatment center for prisoners suffering from mental illness.

A new law that will take effect in January requires that felons deemed sexual “predators” be considered for involuntary psychiatric treatment.

But the state Department of Mental Health and the state Department of Corrections have been slow to implement that proposal, said Joann O’Connor, the hospital’s clinical administrator.

“They need to get off the stick and make a decision,” O’Connor said. “Otherwise, we could close.”

A spokeswoman for the Department of Mental Health was not available late Monday.

Tipton Kindel, a spokesman for the Department of Corrections, said he knew little about the proposal to convert Camarillo to a treatment facility for inmates.

But he agreed that the new law targeting sexual offenders for mental health treatment could represent a new source of patients for the Ventura County facility. He estimated 30 felons a month might be identified for treatment.

“This creates a whole new area where people who are currently being released from prison are not being released and instead are going for this kind of therapy,” Kindel said. “And after a two-year mandatory admission, the whole cycle could start again.”

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Conversion to a prison-like psychiatric unit did not appeal to the the Ventura County Mental Health Board. After listening to Freehauf’s presentation, the board voted unanimously to support maintaining the hospital as a treatment center for the community’s mentally ill.

“To bring the criminals here would be unfair to us, the residents of Ventura County,” said Lita Biejo, a board member and patients rights advocate.