Heywood to open Gardner behavioral health facility
Gardner-based Heywood HealthCare has finalized the purchase of a property Petersham where it will build a treatment center for patients in need of behavioral health services, the community health system announced.
Closing documents were signed on the Sisters of Assumption property on North Main Street in Petersham on Monday. The 21-acre property includes a 75,000-square-foot residence, which war formerly a nursing facility operated by the Sisters of Assumption for its members.
The 2015 state budget included a $1.3 million grant to help Heywood open the facility, in order to address a backlog of patients in need of substance abuse and mental health services in that region of the state.
“Behavioral health and substance abuse services are the number-one health need in North Central and Franklin counties today,” Heywood President and CEO Winfield Brown said in a statement. “Due to lack of beds, we turn away 2,500 patients in urgent need of care each year at Heywood Hospital alone, and we’re the only provider of inpatient behavioral health services in North Central Massachusetts.”
The Heywood treatment center will be an 86-bed facility providing outpatient, residential and inpatient services for adults and adolescents. Now that the sale is complete, Heywood will address property needs, including infrastructure, septic, water and parking projects.
Heywood was granted a special permit by the Petersham Zoning Board of Appeals in April, allowing it to move forward with the project. The health care system said it has received “overwhelming support” from the community.
The project will be completed in three phases, beginning with the creation of an adult residential substance abuse center with intensive inpatient and outpatient services, as well as administrative and medical office and dining and recreational areas. The first phase is slated to be complete by mid-2016, Heywood said. Phases two and three will include a residential adolescent substance abuse treatment program and inpatient detox and mental health unit. Those will be constructed in the coming years.
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