Portland’s overcrowded emergency rooms have become a place of last resort for psychiatric patients. Psychiatric boarding, defined as psychiatric patients’ waiting in hallways or other emergency room areas for inpatient beds, is a serious problem nationwide.

Boarding consumes precious emergency room resources and delays patients receiving treatment. It is often the result of an inability to gain timely access to community-based care – waiting lists for outpatient treatment is now up to eight weeks.

Oregon Health Forum is bringing together a panel of experts on Wednesday, May 25 who’ll look into proposed solutions by delving into this critical issue from the perspective of the institutions, the criminal courts and the hospitals. Registration is now open for this breakfast forum which gets underway at 7 a.m. on Wednesday, May 25 at the Multnomah Athletic Club.

Read about it here.