Most likely, family and friends are the lynchpins of your support system.  The same is (of course) true for the patients that we serve at the Arizona State Hospital – and encouraging and reinforcing interaction with family and friends is a key to Recovery.

An important element in reinforcing family and friend support systems is making it easy for folks to visit with patients- which is why we’re reviewing and revising our visitation policy.  The new policy review will focus on individual needs and flexibility for family and friends so they’ll be able to more conveniently visit with our patients in a more holistic setting while balancing the great treatment programs that are happening daily.  The basic goal of our new visitation policy will be to better promote family involvement.  Cory Nelson has been busy working with the Hospital’s management team this week to develop the new policy.  We’re not exactly sure what week the new changes will be implemented because it’ll take some resource shifting- but our goal is to make the new policies happen by mid-November.

And that’s just the beginning.  I’ve also asked our team to explore how we can more effectively use free video conferencing and social media to help our patients stay in touch with family and friends.  Obviously there are many considerations that come into play with the coming changes- and our hospital team is working hard on the details.

Stay tuned.