Jefferson Cherry Hill Hospital received Oct. 1 a $4 million grant from the State of New Jersey’s Department of Health to become the first health care system in southern New Jersey to implement the EmPATH (Emergency Psychiatric Assessment, Treatment, and Healing) model of care.
This model helps guide Emergency Department patients through a mental or behavioral health crisis while building support to navigate future challenges.
The grant was secured through a direct appropriation by Assembly Majority Leader Louis Greenwald, Assemblywoman Melinda Kane, and State Sen. James Beach.
According to the most recent data, Camden County residents have among the highest rates of mental health distress. Nearly one of every five people seeking treatment at Jefferson Cherry Hill Hospital’s Emergency Department – Camden County’s designated Crisis Center – is doing so for mental or behavioral health needs such as anxiety, depression, suicide attempt, trauma, and drug and alcohol addiction.
EmPATH will allow those patients experiencing a mental or behavioral crisis to be evaluated by mental health specialists (including psychiatrists and licensed therapists) in a calming, living-room style setting, away from the Emergency Department where the busy environment could exacerbate a patient’s situation.
The EmPATH care team can then assess the crisis and develop a plan to address future triggering events by coordinating with other mental health, behavioral health and addiction services to reduce care gaps.
To accommodate the EmPATH model of care, Jefferson Cherry Hill Hospital plans to use the new funding to create a 4,000-square-foot EmPATH facility in existing space adjacent to the existing Emergency Department that will include private, dedicated mental and behavioral health Emergency Department bays along with the calming, living room-style room. The facility is expected to be completed in 2027.
“At Jefferson, we see the challenges that behavioral health needs and substance use disorders are creating in the communities we serve,” said Aaron Chang, president of Jefferson Health-East. “By adopting the EmPATH model, Jefferson Cherry Hill Hospital can immediately begin working with patients in crisis to address their crisis and then match them with providers in their community so they can continue their care at home, instead of in a hospital.”
