Virginia’s senate is poised to consider a couple of bills that could improve mental health care – measures that would change the procedure for putting people in state hospitals against their will. Sandy Hausman has that story.
Under current law, people who try to have a family member committed as a danger to him or herself or others must get sign off from a mental healthcare professional. Delegate Rob Bell wants to get judges involved in the decision.
“With current law, the clinician says no, that’s the end of the story," Bell explains. "We’re going to have a step that would say the clinician goes to a magistrate, everybody gets to make a brief presentation, and then the judge decides.”
And a second bill would require that guardians or family members be notified and allowed to testify before a person picked up by police can be committed.
“Their loved one goes on the run. They don’t know where he is. They’re running up and down the I-95 corridor, trying to find him. They don’t even hear that he’s been picked up in Fredericksburg, that there’s a hearing that’s going to decide his future," Bell says.
Both bills are set for a vote by the Senate Courts of Justice Committee on Monday.