Bossier, Shreveport hospitals unite to offer integrated patient care

SHREVEPORT, La. (KTAL/KMSS) Brentwood Hospital and David Raines Community Health Center have officially agreed to partner and provide patients with comprehensive, integrated healthcare.

David Raines offers primary care, dental care, and behavioral health services. Brentwood Hospital offers psychiatric care. The two hospitals have been transferring and referring patients for a long time.

“We’re excited about developing and formalizing this referral relationship being able to again expand that access to patients who need both of the services that we provide,” says Ceo of David Raines Community Health Center, Willie White.

Brentwood Hospital CEO William Weaver says, “We’re real excited about what we do for the community and excited about continuing to strive to provide more services in collaboration with David Raines.”

The specialty of Brentwood Hospital is treating patients with substance abuse and mental health disorders. Weaver says it is imperative that those working in behavioral health work hand-in-hand with medical partners.

“The prevalence of medical issues, chronic issues with people with mental illness is extremely high. According to NAMI, people with depression have a 40% higher rate of have cardiovascular disease,” said Weaver.

Brentwood Hospital is the largest psychiatric hospital in Louisiana, and Weaver says their work is vital, especially with stigma continuing around mental health.

“Frequently, people aren’t going to look to us in the mental health community because of the stigma. So, if we can get them to talk to their primary care doctor, if we can get them to talk to their nurse practitioner, and then hopefully between this partnership in particular, the integration we can get those conversations going where we can step in and help,” said Weaver.

David Raines Community Health Center serves four parishes and 17 school-based health centers.

“We see that with diabetics, and hypertensive people who have heart attacks, that we could’ve taken care of the high blood pressure much sooner, strokes, all of the things, bad things that can happen, diabetics, that people go undiagnosed and so behavioral patients need that same access and they often very often have both medical and behavioral issues, they aren’t mutually exclusive,” said White.