Vilnius builds new mental health center

Vilnius is building a new modern mental health center in Vasaros Street – Council of the capital approved the decision to build a huge (4150 square meters) 3-storey hospital building by 2022, which will require an investment of EUR 4.5 million. Acute Psychiatry Department, Psychosocial Rehabilitation Department, and other departments, which have so far been operating in the buildings protected by the Department of Cultural Heritage built at the beginning of the last century, will be set up in the new building of the mental health centre, writes vilnius.lt.

The building will have 53 wards (single and double). Psychosocial rehabilitation rooms, audio-visual, light therapy rooms, art therapy, music therapy and work therapy rooms, a computer literacy classroom, sports therapy facilities, a gym, massage rooms, a library – reading room, patient activity rooms, doctor and consultation rooms, meeting rooms and a conference hall will be set up for an effective patient treatment.

“After the implementation of the project, the capital will have the most modern mental hospital in Lithuania with the widest range of services and conditions ensuring patient dignity. The hospital will have a training base for specialists both from Lithuania and the entire Europe. Adapting municipal buildings, which will be vacated after the new building is built, to other needs will be possible,” says Deputy Mayor Edita Tamošiūnaitė.

Eating Disorder Service, the only service of this type in Eastern Europe, was set up in the current buildings in Vasaros Street. The hospital has a Psychosocial Rehabilitation and Crisis Intervention Department, a Psychotherapy Department, a Psychotherapy Day Hospital, a Suicide Prevention Department, a Patient Trustee and Patient Council. Some buildings have not been renovated so far, there are six or ten patients treated in the majority wards, there is a shortage of activity rooms or rooms for psychological counselling in departments.

“The hospital has been undergoing a gradual reconstruction in the past few years: five buildings were renovated, patient treatment conditions and working conditions of employees were improved, and providing new and unique mental health services has become possible. The implementation of the project of construction of a new building will allow working with dignity and meeting all the needs of our patients,” said Jonas Bartlingas, Head of Social Services and Health Department at the City of Vilnius.

The plan is to finish the construction of a new hospital building in 2022. Construction works will cost EUR 4.5 million. The City of Vilnius allocated more than a half of this amount (EUR 2.5 million), EUR 1 million was allocated from the hospital’s budget, and the plan is to obtain the remaining funds from the state investment programme or European Union funds.