Trident Medical Center prepares to break ground on $30 million behavioral hospital

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Trident Medical Center is investing $30.4 million to build the Lowcountry’s first freestanding behavioral hospital in more than 30 years.

The 60-bed facility will provide inpatient and outpatient care for children and adults.

The new hospital will be built on a 17-acre site off U.S. Highway 78, located near Trident Medical Center’s main campus on University Boulevard in North Charleston. Groundbreaking is expected to happen in the fall.

“We’re proud to continue our commitment to meeting the behavioral health needs of Lowcountry families,” Trident Health President and CEO Todd Gallati said. “To illustrate the need for more inpatient behavioral health beds nearly five percent of all hospital admissions in Berkeley, Charleston and Dorchester Counties are behavioral-health related.”

The S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control approved Trident Medical Center’s Certificate of Need in 2018, according to the release.

“Since the last freestanding behavioral health hospital was built in the tri-county area so much has changed in terms of how we treat patients and how we create environments in which they heal,” said Dr. Jeffrey Cluver, medical director of the hospital’s behavioral health program Lowcountry Transitions.

He said that in his 17-year career specializing in psychiatry, he’s further noticed that people are so much more open to seeking help today.

“Our focus is not just on treatment, but full recovery and being able to live a life without experiencing uncontrolled anxiety and depression,” Cluver said.

The new facility will have features that aren’t commonly seen in older behavioral health hospitals, including a large outdoor courtyard to provide patients added therapeutic benefits for both individual and group settings, the release said.

“If you look at the Lowcountry’s health profile meeting our families’ behavioral health needs is as great as meeting their needs for access to high quality cardiac or stroke care,” Gallati said. “Until you have a family member who can benefit from behavioral health services most families don’t realize the importance of having greater access to care.”

Trident Health has been serving Charleston, Berkeley and Dorchester Counties for 45 years and employs more than 2,500 staff and 600 physicians. Current facilities include two acute care hospitals — the 321-bed Trident Medical Center and 124-bed Summerville Medical Center; three freestanding emergency rooms — Brighton Park Emergency, Centre Pointe Emergency and Moncks Corner Medical Center; and two urgent care centers — CareNow Urgent Care Goose Creek and CareNow Urgent Care North Charleston.