🔒Crisis Care: Addiction treatment providers expand as drug-use surge intensifies

When it’s completed later this year, the new Recovery & Wellness Center to be operated by Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center will be the centerpiece of a nearly block-long campus in the heart of New Haven’s Hill neighborhood — the largest center for addiction and mental health treatment in the state.

CEO Michael R. Taylor said the demand for mental health and addiction services is at an all-time high in the New Haven region and he hopes the expanded health center will be enough to meet the growing need.

“Before the pandemic, there was always a need for behavioral health services and unmet need,” Taylor said at a beam-laying ceremony for the center on March 1. “But with the pandemic, that need has now turned into demand and people really need help. That demand is exponentially greater than it was pre-pandemic. We can’t keep up with it.”

Mental health and addiction services providers in and around New Haven are expanding and adding services as the nation continues to confront a surge in mental health issues and drug use.

Drug overdose deaths in Connecticut have been increasing steadily over the last decade, from 357 in 2012 to a high of 1,524 in 2021, according to state Department of Public Health data.

There was a slight decline in deaths to 1,432 in 2022, although that number may be revised upward as cases are determined.

New Haven and Hartford are the sites of most of the state’s deaths and many of the users, according to the state. New Haven County is also home to the state’s largest share of addiction-services providers.

With post-pandemic stressors adding to residents’ mental health challenges, drug addiction is a growing issue, health providers said. Nonprofit and for-profit providers are responding with more programs and treatment slots.

Of increasing concern are potent substances like fentanyl and the animal tranquilizer xylazine, involved in a growing number of overdoses and drug deaths nationally.

“The way to address this problem is not by criminalizing addiction, but by treating it,” New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker said. “What we're doing in New Haven is working with our partners to expand access to people for treatment.”

Mental health stressors

New Haven’s Public Health Department meets regularly with providers including Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center and the APT Foundation as part of its Harm Reduction Taskforce, an effort to reduce overdose deaths and lessen stigma around substance use.

A recent joint effort is the new Mobile Addiction Treatment Team, which travels the city in a specially equipped van that offers medication assisted treatment with no appointment needed.

Drug users can also get their substances or paraphernalia tested for deadly contaminants at a city site at 270 Congress Ave., with no questions asked.

Stress related to the COVID-19 pandemic and its aftermath have worsened mental health in many New Haven-area communities and led to a rise in the numbers of both new substance abuse cases and relapses, said Dr. Ece Tek, chief medical officer for mental health and addiction services at Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center.

“With COVID there were issues with people accessing needed services,” Tek said. “But now, post-COVID, we are seeing higher rates of substance use, as well as mental health issues, complicated by ongoing stressors like employment, housing and all this anxiety.”

For the first time in decades, Tek is also seeing a large increase in the number of people over age 65 seeking addiction treatment.

“They are using hardcore drugs — they are using fentanyl, they are using heroin,” he said. “So this year, for the first time in my life, I’m admitting people to methadone service at age 72, at age 68. It was not the case before.”

The health center has reacted by planning to expand its addiction-treatment services across the board, including at the 31,000-square-foot new facility on Minor Street. Once completed, the building will host 12 therapeutic shelter beds for women compared to the four beds currently available.

Therapy slots will be doubled when the Recovery Center is in operation, and 20 additional staff are scheduled to be hired, including more addiction psychiatrists and psych APRNs, Tek said.

Facilities will also be renovated and expanded at the neighboring South Central Rehabilitation Center, and the two buildings will form an integrated campus allowing for more patients to access all levels and modes of treatment in one location.

Even with the additional capacity, Tek worries that substance use in the New Haven area may continue to trend upward.

“I hope we will be enough for the demand. But who knows?” Tek said. “I hope the demand will not increase. It means more overdoses, more people struggling with addiction.”

Growing pains

Another major provider, the APT Foundation, encountered some resistance last year when planning enhancement of its addiction services in New Haven. APT paid $2.4 million for a former school building and property containing surface parking lots at 794 Dixwell Ave., in December 2021, with plans to consolidate addiction-treatment and administrative services in one location to improve patient access.

Neighbors and political leaders in the Newhallville neighborhood spoke out against APT’s plan at several community meetings, citing potential impact on the densely populated area, and the plan was shelved.

APT and city officials have since worked out a draft proposal for the provider to build a new structure adjacent to its current rented offices at One Long Wharf to house consolidated services in a less residential area.

APT’s new plan — along with more proposals for the city’s Long Wharf district — was presented at a neighborhood meeting in February, with plans to advance it through the planning process later this year.

Another New Haven-based mental health and addiction-services provider, Turnbridge, opened a second residential treatment campus in Killingworth last year, doubling its treatment capacity for clients from age 14 to 17.

The new facility is set on 110 acres and provides “a high staff-to-client ratio, intensive diagnostic assessment, psychometric evaluation and immersive, holistic programming,” according to a company statement.

A privately held company, Turnbridge now runs treatment centers for teens and young adults in Woodbury, North Haven and Westport, in addition to two residential programs in New Haven.

Bridges Healthcare, a Milford-based provider, expanded into West Haven in 2021 and has been advertising its mental health and addiction programs on billboards in New Haven in recent months.

Bolstering growth in addiction treatment has been a flood of funding from opioid settlements: Connecticut is slated to get $300 million over the next 18 years through a single settlement with opioid distributors Cardinal, McKesson, AmerisourceBergen and manufacturer Johnson & Johnson.

The first $11 million in settlement funds arrived in July, with a second $13.5 million arriving in October and distributed to towns and cities for addiction treatment.

The settlement terms require that 85% of the money must be used exclusively for opioid-use prevention, intervention, treatment and recovery, with 15% of that sum going directly to cities and towns and the rest going to the state.

That windfall makes the state attractive to providers, according to industry site Behavehealth.com. “It is expected that $300 million will be funneled into addiction treatment facilities in Connecticut, making this state a potentially well-funded home for a new addiction treatment center,” read a 2022 article entitled “Connecticut is a Smart Choice for Opening Your Next Licensed Addiction Treatment Center.”

The site went on to warn of the state’s persistent labor shortages: “Connecticut addiction treatment should take these statewide staffing concerns very seriously.”

The sector’s growth primarily reflects the intensifying demand for addiction and mental health services even as new funding and new treatments offer hope for those affected, said Tek of Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center.

“There is no end for this crisis, what we are facing right now,” Tek said. “Hopefully recovery and wellness will meet the critical needs.”