'
Attention
May Graduates
v deadline for return of your yellow
Commencement Attendance form is:
April 21,1993
Return it to Records Office, 107 Administration
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There's no limit to the volume
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staffer for the Fall 1995 semester.
We're hiring reporters for the
news, sports and arts &
entertainment sections along with
photographers, copy editors, and
artists.
You don't need to be a journal
ism major. You just need a high
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Stop by the Daily Nebraskan,
34 Nebraska Union to pick up an
application. Applications due by
April 21st.
I
i Doctor: Regional Center ‘hopeless’
By Brian Sharp
Senior Reporter
Officials at the Lincoln Regional
Center denied Thursday a report that
the institution was “in exceptionally
poor shape”.
But one doctor, who has worked at
the institution for more than 15 years,
said the program was “hopeless.”
During the past 125 years, the Lin
coln Regional Center, at West Van
Dorn and Folsom streets, has been
home to some of the state’s most high
profile criminals and most mentally ill
citizens.
In a report by Managers Consult
ing Services of Shawnee, Kan., psy
chologist Darrel Ray wrote, “There is
no evidence of leadership and vision
for the future.”
The center is divided, he said, “with
each protecting its turf and no central
administrative efforts to bring focus
to the campus.
“Any efforts towards change, while
positive, are seen as far too little, too
late.”
The recent managerial review was
commissioned by the center’s admin
istration. Bill Zinn, chief executive
officer for the center has refused com
ment to the Daily Nebraskan.
Ray has conducted institutional
assessments since 1977. The January
review, released to the center earlier
this month, did not study patient care.
In a telephone interview, Ray
complemented Zinn for taking a bold
step in requesting the review, but said
of the center: “This organization has
got major problems, there is no hiding
that. I’ve seen a couple worse—but
I’ve seen a lot better.”
Dale Johnson, director of the Ne
braska Department of Institutions,
which oversees the center, issued a
statement Thursday that he was con
cerned with the center’s management
of health care reform, managed care,
effectiveness and efficiency.
The center referred all questions to
Carole Smith, community relations
coordinator.
Patient contact by psychiatrists and
psychologists was substandard, Ray
said, and professional and support staff
was ineffective.
When questioned about the effect
management had on patient care, Smith
said: “Obviously, there is a link.”
The center has passed all its ac
creditation reviews. An April 27,
1993, federal review favored ac
creditation with recommended im
provement. But it wasn’t until this
year that the reviews included a look
at an institution’s leadership. The
federal organization will review the
center again in 1996.
The doctor, speaking on condition
on anonymity, said administration at
the center had never been effective.
No one speaks out, he said, because
they fear retaliation from an out-of
control bureaucracy.
“They always pass inspection be
cause the paperwork is great, but the
quality of care is not,” he said.
‘Treatment has not been effective,”
he said. “The key problem is they
don’t know what they are supposed to
do to improve a patient. That place is
hopeless.”
The worst patient ward, the doctor
said, was S5. The high-security ward
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is located on the top level of the Fo
rensic Mental Health Unit.
The unit houses 121 men in five
wards. There are convicted sex of
fenders, men found not responsible by
reason of insanity or not competent to
stand trial.
To enter the unit, one must pass
through an electric, sliding, green
metal door. Inside, there is silence,
barred windows, surveillance cameras,
and the low murmur of chant music
echoes down long, stark halls.
“There is a lot of stigma attached to
people who are here,” Smith said.
“There is a lot of misunderstanding.
“It is easy to understand a broken
leg. It is not so easy to understand a
broken mind.”
On one wall, beside a locked stair
door, is painted a large “S5.” The
concrete stairwell is steep and divided
by a metal screen.
But all is not well. Another door,to
the right, leads outside to the yard. It is
marked by a 12-foot, barbed-wire
fence and in the middle stands a bud
ding cherry tree. The small sapling is
shadowed by a marker, which reads:
“In Memorium, Michael F. Weiss —
A Friend.”
Dealing with suicidal patients is a
daily reality, the doctor said.
But the center is changing. A “turn
around team” will institute many of
Ray’s recommendations, Smith said.
Those will include a panel to review
the CEO; officers assigned to oversee
support and clinical staff; and direct
lines of accountability.
“We acknowledge there are
changes that need to be made,” Smith
said. “But there is more to it than just
this report.”
To psychologist Matthew Nessetti,
the center is healthy. Although his
contact with the center is limited, he
said he had been impressed. But the
center remains “bogged down in bu
reaucracy,” he said.
Smith said the report published the
views of 25 staff members. Some of
those perceptions are not accurate,
she said.
“This is a place with a 125-year
culture,” she said. “It’s easy for a
place that old to get into some habits
that may have to be looked at.
“With any organization, you get
little cliques going. Sometimes those
have to be shaken up.”
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