Letters to the Editor

Letter: Psychiatric patient rights

House Bill 366 and its companion, Senate Bill 231, if passed, would give additional rights to adolescents locked in treatment facilities. Yet, the law would not protect adolescents in all locked psychiatric facilities or units.

The gender choice of staff for intimate care law AS18.20.095 only protects some people in locked psychiatric facilities. The psychiatric patient grievance law A S47.30.847 only gives some people in locked psychiatric facilities a right by state law to file a grievance.

The Alaska Legislature must pass laws that protect all people in locked psychiatric facilities or units, and those laws must have an enforcement mechanism.

— Dorrance Collins

Anchorage

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