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Hospital fights release of records
Boise psychiatric center for teens closed after state inspection
found problems
January 26, 2007
By Joe Estrella
A private psychiatric hospital in
Boise has gone to court to prevent the release of state inspection
reports on the hospital's residential treatment center for teens.
Intermountain Hospital, 303 N.
Allumbaugh St., won a temporary restraining order this week
prohibiting the release of documents requested by the Idaho
Statesman, the Boise Weekly and KTVB-TV (Channel 7).
The Statesman filed an open records
request with the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare for
inspection records and other documents covering a 19-month period
that included a riot last July at the teen center, known as the
Residential Treatment Center. The center treated children ages 12-18
with serious behavioral problems.
The teen program has had problems
with patient abuse and overuse of physical and chemical restraints,
the department said last month. The hospital announced then that it
would close the program, which served 16 teens. Most of the patients
were not from Idaho.
Intermountain Hospital contends
that releasing the requested documents would cause it to suffer
"immediate and irreparable injury, loss, or damage." At the
hospital's request, District Judge Joel Horton has sealed all
documents in the case except his temporary restraining order.
Health and Welfare spokesman Ross
Mason said the agency believes the information the hospital wants to
suppress should be open to the public. Department staff members were
gathering and redacting confidential patient information from the
documents when the hospital won its temporary injunction, Mason
said.
The Boise Weekly has intervened in
the case. Its lawyer, Dave Gratton, said he hopes intervention will
lead to release of the sealed records.
The Statesman is weighing its next
step, Managing Editor Bill Manny said.
A hearing was scheduled for
Thursday on the hospital's request for a permanent injunction, but
the hearing was postponed when Horton withdrew from the case because
of his close relationship with the attorney for Boise Weekly, said
Mark Peterson, lawyer for the hospital. A new hearing date has not
been set.
Peterson said the hospital is
arguing that the requested documents are exempt from the Idaho Open
Records Act.
The hospital relinquished its
operating license for the teen program, said Steve Green, a human
services program specialist with Health and Welfare. The hospital
hopes to restart the program when it completes a building expansion
project it began last April.
The rest of the psychiatric
hospital treats both adults and adolescents and is licensed
separately. Health and Welfare has said the rest of the hospital has
not had any major problems.
Contact reporter Joe Estrella at
jestrella@idahostatesman.com or 377-6465.
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