The former workers say understaffing and poor management pushed the private psychiatric hospital -- the only one in Alaska that serves children — to the brink of disaster.
Former North Star Hospital maintenance manager Nick Petito photographed on Thursday, Oct. 27, 2022.
Petito said there was a bright spot: Sometimes he’d be sent to North Star’s Palmer facility on Clark-Wolverine Road. The facility had a completely different feel from the Anchorage campuses, which are larger. Petito felt that the lack of structure was directly feeding the destructive outbursts he would end up repairing. Once, he said, patients completely ripped a door “clean out of its frame.”In the state’s review of the girls’ adolescent program, a parent reported a similar concern about boredom: “They used to play games, puzzles and crochet,” the parent said. “They only watch TV every day and watch the same movie.
Irvin, who says he’s also studying for a master’s degree in social work, was hired as a “Mental Health Specialist II” in mid-August. The Alaska Division of Behavioral Health’s August review of the hospital found some of the same issues. Some days there were so few staff on hand that teachers wouldn’t come for safety reasons, according to Irvin. It happened once a week or so, he said.
A few weeks into his employment, Irvin says he was moving some laundry when a girl rushed by him, letting a group into an area that was off-limits. He said he didn’t want to put hands on the patient, who was being aggressive, so he walked away.Former North Star Hospital counselor Jason Fedeli on Thursday, Oct. 27, 2022.
In some circumstances, based on how many beds were filled, admissions seemed to go the other direction, he said, offered to kids who arguably didn’t require full hospitalization and shouldn’t have been there.
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