Page 14 - Silver Linings Issue2

OUR SERVICES FOR
ADOLESCENTS
Specialized Treatment for Youth
continued from previous page
The directors of Silver Hill Hospital’s adolescent services know young people face a unique set of challenges during the adolescent phase of development. Successful strategies for handling
mental and emotional difficulties during adolescence can prevent suffering in adulthood, they say.
“The reason I enjoy working with adolescents is the deep-seated belief that if you can deal with things now you can save yourself years of suffering afterward,” Frank Bartolomeo, PhD, says. “Most mental health conditions and addictions start in adolescence. That’s why I’ve been focused on adolescents for 30 years.”
Bartolomeo came to Silver Hill Hospital as Director of Adolescent Services in fall 2019. He joined a leadership team that includes Ava Albrecht, MD, who is the
Above: Elizabeth Ortiz-Schwartz, MD, Adolescent TLP Service Chief
Below: Ava Albrecht, MD, Adolescent Inpatient Service Chief.
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Adolescent Inpatient Service Chief, and Elizabeth Ortiz- Schwartz, MD, the Adolescent TLP Service Chief. They have made significant changes in the treatment of mental illness and addiction in young people.
The residential adolescent program was extended from
four weeks to five weeks, and treatment now focuses more heavily on socio-drama therapy. These supportive expressive groups are emotion- and experiential-based. Adolescents
learn DBT (dialectical behavior therapy) skills and receive feedback
from their peers, which Bartolomeo says is more powerful than coming from an adult. It is also more effective than some of the previous cognitive treatments.
“Kids don’t respond to worksheets as well as they do
to engagement,” Bartolomeo says.
“Adolescents need help learning how to express their needs and wants so that they can be acknowledged and effectively addressed.”
Silver Hill’s adolescent programs
are first in launching new outcomes assessments. Measures of depression, anxiety, motivation for change, and emotional regulation are administered upon a patient’s arrival, during the middle of their stay and again at discharge to see where improvements were made and what areas to continue working on.
The data obtained helps determine a program’s effectiveness. A
similar process for launching measurement-based treatment is being implemented in other areas of the hospital as well.
Dr. Frank Bartolomeo,
Director of Adolescent Services