NYU Langone Hospital-Brooklyn, on 55th Street in Sunset Park, has opened a Comprehensive Psychiatric Emergency Program, a dedicated unit for people in a mental health crisis that sits right next to the hospital's emergency department. The health system announced the opening on Oct. 21, alongside a second milestone close to home: its Sunset Park psychiatry residency has graduated its first class.

What the new unit is

A Comprehensive Psychiatric Emergency Program, known in New York as a CPEP, is a hospital unit built specifically for psychiatric emergencies, so that a person in crisis is assessed, treated and observed in a space designed for that purpose rather than in a general emergency room bay.

The Brooklyn unit covers 2,700 square feet and has more than a dozen patient care positions. According to NYU Langone, it includes extended observation beds, individual patient rooms, an observation area and a calming room, plus an interview room, a group therapy area, patient showers and space for clinical staff. Patients who need a longer stay can be admitted to the hospital's 35-bed inpatient psychiatric unit.

A base across the street for the mobile crisis team

The program also gives the hospital's mobile crisis team a new suite in the Augustana building, directly across the street from the hospital. The team does most of its work out in the neighborhood, assessing people in severe behavioral health crises where they are and providing short-term care. The suite has a workroom and two consultation rooms, and patients can come there for supportive counseling.

Both pieces add to a behavioral health clinic that recently opened at the Augustana Family Health Center at NYU Langone, which has 20 individual offices for outpatient mental health care and is expected to see about 1,200 patients a year. NYU Langone describes the emergency unit, the inpatient unit and the mobile team as one connected system meant to move people from a crisis into ongoing treatment.

Sunset Park's first psychiatry graduates

The same announcement marked the first graduating class of the Family Health Centers at NYU Langone Psychiatry Residency, which is based in Sunset Park. Three residents finished the four-year program, which was set up through the federal Teaching Health Center Graduate Medical Education Program to prepare psychiatrists for community-based work. Residents train at a federally qualified health center, do their inpatient training at NYU Langone Hospital-Brooklyn, and rotate through schools, shelters, NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue and other community settings.

One of the three, Dr. Shiyu Chen, is staying on with the Family Health Centers as an attending psychiatrist. Dr. Chen, who is originally from China and speaks Mandarin, will see patients at Sunset Terrace and through NYU Langone's Community Medicine Program in Manhattan, which serves people living in supportive housing. Dr. Chen has said the chance to care for Sunset Park's immigrant families in both English and Mandarin was the reason for choosing the program.

Dr. W. Gordon Frankle, who chairs NYU Langone's Department of Psychiatry, helped establish the residency.

Where it is and how to get help

NYU Langone Hospital-Brooklyn is at 150 55th Street, Brooklyn, NY 11220, near the Sunset Park waterfront. The main hospital number is 718-630-7000, and the emergency department is reached at 718-630-7185. The nearest subway stops are on Fourth Avenue: the R at 53rd Street and the N and R at 59th Street.

Anyone in a mental health crisis, or worried about someone who is, can also call or text 988, the national Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, at any hour. In an emergency, call 911.

Sources