Imagine someone you love is experiencing anxiety, depression or hallucinations. You know it’s serious but not an emergency.

You want to keep them with you at home but need someone to assess the situation to assure they are safe. You call various providers only to find that the soonest appointment you can schedule is weeks away.

You’re concerned, maybe even frightened, and although the thought of taking them to a busy emergency room is not your preference, you’re left with no other option.

This scenario happens all too often and demonstrates a gap in our nation’s mental health system, said Jody McCloud-Missmer, Administrator, St. Luke’s Behavioral Health Services.

In response to this problem, the behavioral health team of St. Luke’s University Health Network, supported by senior leadership, has created an innovative approach to filling the void.

St. Luke’s will open the region’s first outpatient walk-in mental health center to provide behavioral health assessments and referrals in a comfortable, homelike, nonintimidating environment for residents in Carbon, Monroe and Pike counties. Open every day, patients 14 and older can seek help with conditions such as anxiety, panic attacks, depression, grief, thoughts of self-harm, mood swings, anger and school phobia in a comfortable, nonintimidating environment. Patients must come willingly.

Patients are assessed and then may be seen by a psychotherapist, have an appointment with a psychiatrist or if necessary, sent to an emergency room for further evaluation, she explained.

It is not a place for people experiencing an acute psychotic state or who attempted or are actively planning suicide. Nor do you come for an appointment every week. Patients don’t come in and leave with medications.

“Someone with panic attacks has to pull over three times on the way to the center because they are afraid to drive is an example of who should see us,” said Allanson-Dundon. “Or someone at their wits’ end because they’ve lost the ability to manage their marriage and need to talk with someone. Or a person with schizophrenia, who can comfortably live with the voices in their head but feels something is changing.”

A therapist, crisis intervention specialists, case managers and support personnel staff the center and offer access to psychiatrists and psychiatric advance practitioners as needed.

“It is the full continuum - a one-stop shop,” said McCloud-Missmer. “Nothing like this exists.”

Other crisis centers in Pennsylvania are clinical in design, added Amie Allanson-Dundon, MS, LPC, CAADC, Network Director, Clinical Therapy Services.

Located at St. Luke’s Lehighton Campus, 211 N. 12th St., the center occupies the area of the former emergency room, since relocated to St. Luke’s Carbon Campus, routes 476 and 209. Gutted and redesigned, it now bears little resemblance to a busy, clinical ER.

“That’s one of the cool things about this center,” said Allanson-Dundon. “It isn’t a sterile, clinical space with exam rooms and beds. Rather, envision walking into a space that makes you comfortable. You have a love seat, comfortable chairs, soothing colors on the walls and calming art - a quiet space to decompress. The ambience is conducive to healing from the moment you walk in the door.”

To meet each patient’s needs, it has an open concept waiting area, small rooms with recliners for those needing less distraction and private spaces where patients talk privately one-on-one with a clinician.

The idea for the walk-in center arose when St. Luke’s leaders were planning the new St. Luke’s Carbon Campus.

“We knew that a lot of individuals were utilizing the emergency department for psychiatric services and talked about how we could provide them in a better way.”

Meanwhile, Tina Clymer, Administrator, Carbon-Monroe-Pike Mental Health and Developmental Services, submitted a grant proposal to the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services for an “urgent care” services center, which was approved.

A portion of the grant was allocated to the center’s startup costs.

Working with Najma Khanani, MD, Medical Director of the Lehighton Campus Psychiatric Services, and others throughout the network, the concept was developed and created.

“It’s been a huge undertaking - an outpatient office with extended hours without appointments. We’re excited to see how the community adapts and responds to us,” Allanson Dundon said. “This has the potential to be a great service.”