Collins meets with Northern Lights officials, discusses efforts to meet need for behavioral health services

BANGOR, Maine (WABI) -Senator Susan Collins was in Bangor Wednesday touring Northern Light Hospitals.

She met with officials at both Acadia Hospital and Eastern Maine Medical Center to discuss their efforts to meet the need for behavioral health services.

Acadia is in the midst of a construction project that will allow them to better serve the state’s needs by offering more bed space, which is a critical need.

”When I meet with hospital administrators, no matter where they are located in the state of Maine, finding care for children with mental health challenges is their number one issue. They just don’t know what to do. This morning, we heard a story about a child in the emergency room at Eastern Maine Medical Center asking if the Easter Bunny came to the emergency room to see them during that holiday. We need to do better, and the resources that we will have here at Acadia Hospital will allow those children to come out of the emergency room environment and into the therapeutic environment that they need,”

Collins recently secured more than $3,000,000 for Northern Light Health in the Fiscal Year 2023 appropriations bill to support the Acadia expansion effort.

It still must be voted on by Congress.

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