Kansas to resume training for mental health technicians at Osawatomie

The state is restarting a training program for mental health technicians at Osawatomie State Hospital.

It’s part of an effort to improve staffing at the struggling state-run mental hospital in eastern Kansas.

“We want more people in the community to take that training so they can come work for us,” said Angela de Rocha, a spokeswoman for the Kansas Department of Aging and Disability Services, which runs the hospital. “It’s aiming at expanding the pool of trained workers that we can hire.”

The program will train mental health technicians, assistants who help other staff assess, escort and monitor patients. De Rocha said the state stopped the training last fall to reorganize. It will restart in June.

“They do tasks that free up the more highly professional staff, like the pyschologists and pyschiatrists, to deliver specific treatment to folks,” de Rocha said.

KDADS has battled staffing problems like overtime and turnover at the hospital, which primarily serves southern and eastern Kansas. Osawatomie lost its Medicare certification in December after federal inspectors found unsafe conditions for patients.

“That will go a long way toward solving our overtime problems,” de Rocha said. “It will reduce stress on employees.”

The agency also announced last week that registered nurses at the hospital would receive a 10 percent raise.

This story was originally published April 5, 2016 at 6:02 PM with the headline "Kansas to resume training for mental health technicians at Osawatomie."