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Buffalo Psychiatric Center's mission is to operate in collaboration with the local mental health systems of Erie, Niagara, Chautauqua and Cattaraugus counties to serve individuals with serious mental illness in a way that empowers the recipient and fosters hope and recovery.

Description:
Buffalo Psychiatric Center provides treatment and rehabilitation services to adults 18 and over who have serious and long lasting mental illnesses. Inpatient, outpatient, residential, vocational, and wellness services. The main campus is at 400 Forest Ave., Buffalo, NY 14213; in addition, the facility operates several supervised residences in the community and numerous outpatient resource and treatment centers in its service area. Currently, the facility serves 240 inpatients and more than 1800 individuals through community-based services.

History:
The State of New York has been providing mental health services since 1843 when the first state asylum for the insane was established in Utica. Prior to that time, individuals with a mental illness who were without financial resources were placed in county poorhouses. They received no special treatment there.

New York State's involvement in mental health came about because of the efforts of Dorothea Dix and others who sought a more humane means of dealing with individuals suffering from mental illness. The purpose of the asylums that evolved from this effort was to offer a refuge from the pressures of society.
Initially the asylums were established to provide moral treatment, plenty of fresh air, good food, and clothing--tender-loving-care, if you will. This type of care, it was felt, would promote the return of good mental health.

Buffalo State Hospital for the Insane was the fifth state hospital to be built and the first to be opened in the western end of the state. The first patients were admitted here November 18, 1880.
The mid-1950s saw the development of psychotropic or tranquilizing medication, which had the ability to dramatically reduce the severity of the symptoms of mental illness. The late 1950s and early 1960s also brought the beginnings of a change of philosophy regarding the treatment of mental illness, a change signified by the community mental health movement.

The new thinking of professionals and others was that individuals should not be removed from their communities when they are suffering from mental illness. Rather, they should be treated in the least restrictive environment. At the same time the state of New York began formulating its policy of “deinstitutionalization” as a means of releasing individuals who no longer needed institutional care because of the new medication and/or because they did not present a danger to themselves or others. This policy was implemented in the late 1960s and through the mid-1970s.

Buffalo State Hospital was renamed Buffalo Psychiatric Center in 1975, one year after the historic H.H. Richardson-designed buildings were closed as patient care buildings.

Contact person: Susan Joffe, Director of Public Information/Volunteers, (phone), (email)
Office fax number: (716) 885-4852

Address:

400 Forest Ave. Buffalo, NY 14213 (See a map)

Directions:

The main campus of Buffalo Psychiatric Center is at the corner of Elmwood and Forest Avenues, just south of the Buffalo State College campus.   Nearest Metro/Subway Stop: N/A   Nearest Bus Stop: Elmwood at Forest, 1 minute walk