Prairie Ridge celebrating 50th anniversary
MASON CITY — Prairie Ridge in Mason City on Thursday celebrated its 50th year of providing quality substance abuse and mental health treatment to individuals and families throughout the area.
Executive director Lorrie Young says the organization is excited to be marking five decades of service to the community. “There’s been a lot of change over the last 50 years both in terms of policy and funding, but we’re at a point where we understand that outcomes improve when we can provide truly integrated care, whole person care for the individuals we serve. We’re excited to be able to provide treatment for substance use disorders and gambling disorders as we have historically, and two years ago becoming the community mental health center in adding mental health treatment.”
Young says people may not be aware of Prairie Ridge taking over mental health services from Wellsource and the former North Iowa Mental Health Center a few years ago. She says her organization as well as several private mental health service providers have been trying to step up to serve the needs of the community. “We know that even with everybody doing the best that they can, there’s still not enough services to meet the demand. So while we are really proud of the fact that that we started from day one working to meet the needs of the individuals that were being served by the mental health center, we also remain eternally grateful to the community partners that were a significant part of making sure that nobody fell through the cracks when that transition happened.”
A new full-service pharmacy is currently being constructed in the Prairie Ridge building. Young says research shows that patients are helped more when there is an on-site pharmacy where they are getting treated. She says they are partnering with Genoa Pharmacies, which specializes in medications to treat behavioral healthcare conditions. “So they are really instrumental in helping to provide patient education, consultation support, getting pre-authorizations, making sure that patients have what they need when they need it. I also think that for a lot of our patients, when they’re struggling, having to go five or six different places to get their needs met can feel really, really overwhelming. A lot of them have transportation concerns, so to be able to do everything in one location, to be able to see a provider, get a prescription if they need it, be able to get their medication on site, for patient to have injections to be able to have somebody to do that here, it just simplifies their lives in a way that it’s something we can do to make it easier for them.”
Young says Prairie Ridge is blessed and grateful to the communities that they’ve been able to serve in the last 50 years. “We’re grateful for all of you in helping to get the word out that help is available, that care is available in an environment that doesn’t see the people we serve is broken, but sees them as courageous individuals, making choices to live their lives with purpose.”
Yesterday’s celebration was for staff and employees. A public celebration as well as 5K walk and run will be held on their campus at 320 North Eisenhower on Saturday September 21st
