Psychiatric hospitals, also known as mental health hospitals, behavioral health hospitals, are hospitals or wards specializing in the treatment of severe mental disorders, such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, eating disorders, dissociative identity disorder, major depressive disorder and many others. Psychiatric hospitals vary widely in their size and grading. Some hospitals may specialize only in short-term or outpatient therapy for low-risk patients. Others may specialize in the temporary or permanent containment of patients who need routine assistance, treatment, or a specialized and controlled environment due to a psychiatric disorder. Patients often choose voluntary commitment, but those whom psychiatrists believe to pose significant danger to themselves or others may be subject to involuntary commitment and involuntary treatment. Psychiatric hospitals may also be called psychiatric wards/units when they are a subunit of a regular hospital.
The Rosenhan experiment or Thud experiment was an experiment conducted to determine the validity of psychiatric diagnosis. The participants feigned hallucinations to enter psychiatric hospitals but acted normally afterwards. They were diagnosed with psychiatric disorders and were given antipsychotic medication. The study was conducted by psychologist David Rosenhan, a Stanford University professor, and published by the journal Science in 1973 under the title "On Being Sane in Insane Places". It is considered an important and influential criticism of psychiatric diagnosis, and broached the topic of wrongful involuntary commitment. Rosenhan along with 8 other people went into these 12 hospitals across 5 states along the West coast of the US. The pseudo-patients who were only admitted for a short period of time went to a different hospital, hence they went to 12 hospitals but there were only 9 participants altogether. In 2019 and 2023, historians of psychiatry published evidence that the experiment is a hoax.
The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health is a psychiatric teaching hospital located in Toronto and ten community locations throughout the province of Ontario, Canada. It reports being the largest research facility in Canada for mental health and addictions. The hospital was formed in 1998 from the amalgamation of four separate institutions – the Queen Street Mental Health Centre, the Clarke Institute of Psychiatry, the Addiction Research Foundation, and the Donwood Institute. It is Canada's largest mental health teaching hospital, and the only stand-alone psychiatric emergency department in Ontario. CAMH has 90 distinct clinical services across inpatient, outpatient, day treatment, and partial hospitalization models. CAMH has been the site of major advancements in psychiatric research, including the discovery of the Dopamine receptor D2.
The Institute of Mental Health (IMH), formerly known as Woodbridge Hospital, is a psychiatric hospital in Hougang, Singapore.
The Manhattan Psychiatric Center is a New York-state run psychiatric hospital on Wards Island in New York City. As of 2009, it was licensed for 509 beds, but holds only around 200 patients. The current building is 17 stories tall. The building strongly resembles the main building of the Creedmoor Psychiatric Center in Queens. It is adjacent to Kirby Forensic Psychiatric Center, a specialized facility for patients with criminal convictions.
Psychiatric nursing or mental health nursing is the appointed position of a nurse that specialises in mental health, and cares for people of all ages experiencing mental illnesses or distress. These include: neurodevelopmental disorders, schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, mood disorders, addiction, anxiety disorders, personality disorders, eating disorders, suicidal thoughts, psychosis, paranoia, and self-harm.
Bryce Hospital opened in 1861 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, United States. It is Alabama's oldest and largest inpatient psychiatric facility. First known as the Alabama State Hospital for the Insane and later as the Alabama Insane Hospital, the building is considered an architectural model. The hospital currently houses 268 beds for acute care, treatment and rehabilitation of full-time (committed) patients. The Mary Starke Harper Geriatric Psychiatry Hospital, a separate facility on the same campus, provides an additional 100 beds for inpatient geriatric care. The main facility was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1977.
Liaison psychiatry, also known as consultative psychiatry or consultation-liaison psychiatry is the branch of psychiatry that specialises in the interface between general medicine/pediatrics and psychiatry, usually taking place in a hospital or medical setting. The role of the consultation-liaison psychiatrist is to see patients with comorbid medical conditions at the request of the treating medical or surgical consultant or team. Consultation-liaison psychiatry has areas of overlap with other disciplines including psychosomatic medicine, health psychology and neuropsychiatry.
Castle Peak Hospital is the oldest and largest psychiatric hospital in Tuen Mun, Hong Kong. It has located at the east of Castle Peak in Tuen Mun, the hospital was established in 1961. Currently, it has 1,156 beds, providing a wide variety of psychiatric services such as adult psychiatry, forensic psychiatry, psychogeriatric services, child and adolescent psychiatry, consultation-liaison psychiatry and substance abuse treatments. All wards in the hospital are equipped to accommodate both voluntary and involuntary admitted patients.
Oregon State Hospital is a public psychiatric hospital in the U.S. state of Oregon, located in the state's capital city of Salem with a smaller satellite campus in Junction City opened in 2014. Founded in 1862 and constructed in the Kirkbride Plan design in 1883, it is the oldest operating psychiatric hospital in the state of Oregon, and one of the oldest continuously operated hospitals on the West Coast.
The Institute of Living is a comprehensive psychiatric facility in Hartford, Connecticut, that offers care across the spectrum of psychiatric services, including:
The North Texas State Hospital (NTSH) is an inpatient mental health facility owned by the State of Texas and under the Texas Health and Human Service Commission's Health and Specialty Care System division. NTSH has three campuses, one in Wichita Falls and two in Vernon.
The Valkenberg Hospital is a large, government-funded, tertiary psychiatric hospital in the city of Cape Town, South Africa.
Florida State Hospital (FSH) is a hospital and psychiatric hospital in Chattahoochee, Florida. Established in 1876, it was Florida's only state mental institution until 1947. It currently has a capacity of 1,042 patients. The hospital's current Administration Building is on the National Register of Historic Places.
Cherry Hospital is an inpatient regional referral psychiatric hospital located in Goldsboro, North Carolina, United States. As one of three psychiatric hospitals operated by the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services, it provides services to 38 counties in the eastern region of North Carolina. It is part of the Division of State Operated Healthcare Facilities within the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees and manages 14 state-operated healthcare facilities that treat adults and children with mental illness, developmental disabilities, and substance use disorders. The Division's psychiatric hospitals provide comprehensive inpatient mental health services to people with psychiatric illness who cannot be safely treated at a lower level of care.
Riverview Hospital was a Canadian mental health facility located in Coquitlam, British Columbia. It operated under the governance of BC Mental Health & Addiction Services until it closed, in July 2012. In December 2015, the provincial government announced plans to replace the obsolete buildings with new mental health facilities, scheduled to open in about 2019. On October 12, 2021, the new Red Fish Healing Centre for Mental Health and Addiction opened on the site.
Providence Care is a teaching hospital affiliated with Queen's University located in Kingston, Ontario that was built in 1861. Providence Care is a not-for-profit organization governed by a volunteer Board of Directors and sponsored by the Catholic Health Corporation of Ontario. The Worship Centre overlooks Lake Ontario and was designed with input from faith leaders from the Kingston, Ontario community. Providence Care has 585 patient beds. Providence Care is a partner within Kingston's University hospitals in the Southeast LHIN, delivering health care, conducting research and training health care professionals.
The lunatic asylum was an early precursor of the modern psychiatric hospital.
Alabama Department of Mental Health is the state agency responsible for serving Alabama citizens with mental illnesses, intellectual disabilities, and substance use disorders. The department was formally established by ACT 881 in 1965.
Mental health in Russia is covered by a law, known under its official name—the Law of the Russian Federation "On Psychiatric Care and Guarantees of Citizens' Rights during Its Provision", which is the basic legal act that regulates psychiatric care in the Russian Federation and applies not only to persons with mental disorders but all citizens. A notable exception of this rule is those vested with parliamentary or judicial immunity. Providing psychiatric care is regulated by a special law regarding guarantees of citizens' rights.
