SUMMERSVILLE, WV (WOAY) – Seneca Health Services is a mental health provider for Nicholas, Greenbrier, Pocohantas, Webster and Clay counties.
For the past 45 years, they’ve been working to help people with substance use disorder through their various outpatient programs.
Now, they can expand that as they look to open Recovery Ridge, a new 12-bed short-term recovery center for men in Summersville.
Regional Crisis and Case Management Coordinator Angela Hypes believes this facility will help serve the area tremendously providing closer-to-home access to care.
“There is such a need, I think, everywhere in the state of West Virginia but especially here in our rural community in Nicholas County,” she said. “Clients were traveling to Charleston, Huntington which is well over 100 miles away to receive treatment, and we’re really excited to be able to provide this treatment in our small area and our small community.”
This idea was brought to life in 2017 through the Ryan Brown Addiction Prevention and Recovery Fund as Seneca received, in partnership with FMRS and Southern Highlands, close to $3 million
Men with substance use disorder will be accepted into the program through referral and approval.
Coordinator Clorinda Workman will handle that and from there, they will receive round-the-clock care for about 28 days and be able to participate in medically-assisted treatment as well as peer recovery programs.
Joshua O’Dell will be one of the peer recovery support specialists.
“A lot of people actually prefer to talk with somebody who actually has that experience rather than talking to a doctor or anything like that,” O’Dell said. “It’s just a different setting and someone they can relate to that’s been through it.”
O’Dell says he has been clean for two years now and that a facility like this would have been a game changer in his recovery, but now he hopes this will soon help change the lives of the men who are in a similar place now that he once was.
For Seneca, it will allow them to better serve a community in need.
“I think that this project has exceeded our expectations. I mean, if you look around, it’s gorgeous. It’s comfortable. I think the men are going to feel at home here while working on their treatment and their recovery,” Hypes said.
The project is expected to be completed in late May, early June.
If you are interested in a job at Recovery Ridge, click here.
