South Beach Psychiatric Center

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South Beach Psychiatric Center
Closed 2011
Current Status Closed
Building Style Cottage Plan
Location Staten Island, NY
Alternate Names



History[edit]

South Beach Psychiatric Center is operated by the New York State Office of Mental Health. It provides intermediate-level, inpatient psychiatric services to 230 residents of Staten Island and Brooklyn, and outpatient behavioral healthcare in multiple community-based clinics to more than 3,000 individuals living in western Brooklyn and on Staten Island. The Center also operates a specialized eight-bed inpatient unit for monolingual Chinese persons from New York City who are in need of intermediate-level inpatient psychiatric care. In recognition of its outstanding quality of care,its leadership in providing cutting-edge treatment for serious psychiatric disorders (e.g.,Recovery-Oriented Cognitive Therapy, Dialectical Behavior Therapy, and APA Guidelines-based pharmacotherapies), and its contribution to the communities it serves, in 2015, New York State contracted for the construction of a new, state-of-the art, $350 million dollar inpatient facility on the Center's Staten Island main campus, to replace the existing inpatient buildings that opened in 1973. The new building was set to open in early 2020. However, as a result of the overwhelming impact of the Covid-19 pandemic in New York City at the time, New York State temporarily arranged for the Northwell Health System to staff and operate the new building and use it to treat Covid patients who had overwhelmed the existing NYC hospital infrastructure. Then, in September 2021, with the Covid crisis mitigated in NYC, the entire South Beach Psychiatric Center inpatient program moved into the new building. It was built well-above flood levels experienced during Hurricane Sandy in 2012 and provides panoramic views on the shoreline from the east shore of Staten Island of lower New York Bay and the Verrazzano Bridge that connects Staten Island to Brooklyn.

Images[edit]

Video[edit]

  • The following nearly sixty minute 1983 Academy Award-nominated documentary video entitled "Children of Darkness" was filmed mostly inside South Beach Psychiatric Center. This documentary was produced and written by Richard Kotak and Ara Chekmayan. It explores the topic of juvenile psychiatry in the 80's and highlights the lack of mental health resources and care in America by focusing on the treatment of children living in multiple facilities.