Mental health professionals and local businesses helped cut the ribbon last week on a new outpatient mental health facility that is open for business on First Street in Slidell.

The Community Care Counseling Center is part of a Louisiana-based company known as Community Care Inc. that has provided outpatient counseling and treatment for mental health patients since 1994. The company is based in New Orleans and has another center in Houma, and now Slidell.

After Hurricane Katrina, St. Tammany Parish and the surrounding area saw a decline in mental health care because of the lack of doctors and facilities where patients could be treated, said Leah Wilborn, director of marketing for Community Care.

Paul Kavanaugh, fourth from left, owner of Community Care Counseling Centers gets ready to cut the ribbon on his new center in Slidell last week. From left are, Jennifer Stritinzer, Charlene Tavar, Kavanaugh, Kelly Joseph, program director for the center, Jerry Labit, Community Care community liaison; Alvin McKinnis, mental health technician; Cecelia Glaviano, social worker; Rita Kelley, Helene Davis Nunez, Marlene Masely and Jack Francione of the East St. Tammany Chamber of Commerce. (Staff Photo by Erik Sanzenbach)

“Right now, most of the mentally ill are going to hospital emergency rooms for treatment, which is causing problems,” Wilborn said.

The Slidell Community Care Counseling Center will provide a place for the mentally ill to come and spend the day in four different group therapy sessions. The center will treat those that are chronically ill, Wilborn said, and be a place where the patients can spend the day to keep them out of hospitals.

“We provide transportation and meals for the patients,” Wilborn said.

On staff at the center are psychiatrists, psychologists, clinical social workers, nurses and mental health technicians.

Tim Brown, M.D., is the center’s medical director. A psychiatrist, Brown said the center will treat all sorts of mental illnesses, except for substance addiction.

“Since the storm, we are seeing a lot of people with depression,” Brown said.

He said the other important function of the center is to help the families of the mentally ill.

“A lot of support for the families is needed,” Brown said.

Wilborn said the center was needed in the parish, because of the influx of people from New Orleans who have decided to stay in St. Tammany Parish. Wilborn said the center in New Orleans offers inpatient treatment while Houma and Slidell is outpatient only.

Brown said the center hopes to help patients all over the parish as well as residents from the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

The center does accept Medicaid, Medicare and private insurance.