Boston Hope is a 1,000-bed medical facility constructed at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center in order to house patients recovering from COVID-19. Partners HealthCare created Boston Hope in collaboration with Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker, Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh, Boston HealthCare for the Homeless, and the United States military. The field hospital was launched in order to decrease the load on local hospitals by caring for COVID-19 patients with milder symptoms.
The field hospital has also allowed Boston to increase its supply of beds for those who are homeless, and Boston Hope has actively worked toward testing the entire adult homeless population for COVID-19. Thus far, nearly one-third of the adult homeless population has tested positive for COVID-19. As we have seen in other populations, many of those tested positive did not have any symptoms. Boston Hope is one site that will house COVID-19-positive who are homeless as a means of limiting the spread in the homeless community.
A significant proportion of the homeless population suffers from mental illness; thus, an important component of the care delivered at Boston Hope has focused on the mental health of the residents. Katherine Koh, MD, MSc, a psychiatrist from MGH, along with MGH/McLean PGY-3 resident Dr. Samuel Doston, have been working with the Boston Health Care for the Homeless Program (BHCHP) to care for the homeless at Boston Hope. Dr. Koh notes that caring for the homeless population presents a unique set of challenges. This is a population with high rates of substance use disorders, PTSD, and psychosis, with limited access to consistent care and high rates of treatment nonadherence. Further complicating the provision of care to this group is the diversity of the homeless population, which includes women-led families, veterans, and LGBTQ youth who present with a broad range of psychiatric disorders and have specific needs.
She comments, “It has been a tremendous experience to work with Sam in creating a mental health disaster response for homeless patients at Boston Hope. Homeless individuals live in a constant state of crisis. Yet ironically, disaster planning has rarely included this population. Our experience has shown that creative clinical interventions can be implemented to care for the mental health needs of homeless patients in a time of heightened crisis.”
Read More:
Koh KA. Psychiatry on the Streets—Caring for Homeless Patients. JAMA Psychiatry. 2020;77(5):445–446.
