Gundersen promotes EmPATH system for emergency behavioral health needs in La Crosse

The Emplify health system in La Crosse is introducing a new behavioral health care program.

The EmPATH unit will operate at Gundersen in La Crosse, as a new method of helping mental health patients who come to the emergency room. Emplify director Josh Court says the system is now being used in other parts of the world.

“Seventy-five per cent of patients who are treated in an EmPATH unit stabilize and return home within 24 hours,” Court tells reporters, “without needing an inpatient admission, or a lengthy time sitting in an emergency room.”

Court says more staff could be hired by Emplify in the next couple of years to operate the EmPATH program, and meet community needs. It will be based in a facility now being constructed on the Gundersen campus in La Crosse, which should be open by next year. Court says the creation of the local unit came partly in reaction to a recent hospital closing in Eau Claire.