Overview
- NewYork-Presbyterian says it has expanded capacity and safety steps since 2022, as the Monday settlement announced by Attorney General Letitia James orders broad fixes and a $500,000 payment with $10,000 fines for future breaches.
- The agreement requires stronger screening for suicide and violence risk, mandatory observation with monitoring logs, immediate leadership alerts when a patient leaves early, scheduled follow‑ups, electronic record upgrades, and tighter discharge planning.
- The hospital system must reopen licensed psychiatric beds after investigators found more than 100 beds were still offline as of May 2023.
- Investigators, focusing in large part on the Brooklyn Methodist campus, detailed cases where patients with psychosis or suicidal or violent thoughts left ERs without clearance, including one man deemed dangerous who fled after two days waiting for a bed.
- Stricter checks and more open beds could keep high‑risk patients from slipping through gaps in care, an urgent need as New York has seen a sharp rise in mental health demand since the pandemic.