Trident Medical Center to build $30.4 million mental health facility

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In 2020 as the pandemic struck, one in five adults reported suffering from mental illness, according to data from the National Alliance on Mental Illness.

It has been 30 years since the last freestanding behavioral health hospital opened in the Lowcountry to provide treatment for patients, and Trident Medical Center saw the community need for a new facility.

The Trident Health System is expanding with plans to build a $30.4 million freestanding behavioral health hospital in Ladson. The 58,790-square-foot one-story hospital will built on 17 acres at 3445 Ingleside Blvd.

“Expanding access to mental health services has been identified as one of the top health care needs in South Carolina,” Trident President and CEO Christina Oh said in a statement. “Our new freestanding 60-bed hospital that is currently under construction is evidence of our commitment to addressing this much-needed service. When it opens in the spring of 2023 it’ll provide inpatient and outpatient services for pediatric, adult and geriatric patients.”

Last year alone, Trident Health System cared for nearly 300,000 Lowcountry patients at its Trident Medical Center, Summerville Medical Center and three freestanding emergency rooms: Brighton Park Emergency, Centre Pointe Emergency and Moncks Corner Medical Center.

Between Trident and Colleton Medical Center in Walterboro, nearly 2,000 patients received help in the region during that time, said Jeffrey Cluver, psychiatrist and medical director for Trident’s Behavioral Health services. Outpatient support cared for nearly 6,000 patients.

“Treating mental health disease is as important as treating heart disease and cancer,” Cluver said in a statement. “Help is available. Since the last freestanding behavioral health hospital was built in the tri-county area so much has changed in terms of how we treat patients and how we create environments in which they heal.” 

Cluver added that meeting families’ behavioral health needs is as important as meeting their needs for cardiac or stroke car.

Kelly Troyer, community outreach coordinator for NAMI, has a son who receives treatment for a mental health disease, and said Trident’s expansion is good for the community.

“There are a lot of people in the Lowcountry and around the state who are excited that Trident Medical Center has taken a lead in expanding mental health services,” Troyer said in a statement. “I can tell from personal experience their physicians and clinicians who care for patients with mental health are loving and dedicated people. I’m also thankful that parents, who might suddenly find a loved needing mental health care, will have a new hospital where their loved one can receive treatment.”