Steve Martorano 
The Behavioral Corner is produced in partnership with Retreat Behavioral Health -- where healing happens.

The Behavioral Corner 
Hi, and welcome. I'm Steve Martorano, and this is the Behavioral Corner. You're invited to hang with us as we discuss how we live today, the choices we make, what we do, and how they affect our health and well-being. So you're on the corner, the Behavioral Corner. Please hang around for a while.

Steve Martorano 
Hi, everybody, welcome to the Behavioral Corner as we forge ahead into the month of November. I'm Steve Martorano, your host and guide you know me, I hang here on the corner and I wait for interesting and informative people to come by and help us talk about well, everything because that's what the podcast is about. It's about everything that affects our behavioral health. It is made possible by our great underwriting partners, Retreat Behavioral Health, you'll hear more about them down the road. In addition to the finances that make this possible. Retreat is an endless well of information and expert commentary through their staff. No greater example of that is my pal right here, Maggie Hunt. Maggie is with Retreat Behavioral Hunt, and they're going to change the name Retreat Behavioral Health in so many capacities, that I can't begin to list them all. She has helped us enormously on this program many many times that she does. So again today. Hello, Maggie.

Maggie Hunt 
Hello.

Steve Martorano 
Good to see you. You know when I just wanted to Google just to get some spelling, right? And your Google page, the first page 75 to 80% of what comes up in addition to your link, you know, your LinkedIn stuff and all that are your contributions to this program, which I think made us film reviews with her with her running mate, Grace Shorber. She does. And she's here today in the single capacity of alumni, corporate alumni coordinate with regard to the facility and the people that have gone through it, and had much success. And it's an unusual situation because I don't know of many facilities behavioral health or substance abuse facilities that actually have alumni groups. So Maggie...Maggie is in charge of that. And she's going to join us to tell us about how long has Retreat had the alumni group back.

Maggie Hunt  
Yeah, I mean, I think as long as we've had patients that have left Retreat we've had alumni. They started their alumni meetings. The first one they had was November 11, 2011, because they had shirts made that were that said 11-11-11. That was the first meeting that we had.

Steve Martorano  
Over 10 years. And well, how did it begin? What was what is? What was its origin story, and what's the purpose of an alumni group?

Maggie Hunt  
It started because we had patients who left who wanted to come back and give back they had such great experiences at Retreat, that they never wanted to leave, or they wanted to just keep coming back up and share their experience with patients or come back and see the staff and show them how good they were doing on the outside and give back or give different opportunities to people or, you know, to staff that you know, to kind of give them a break kind of share different experiences with them. So that's kind of how it started. And I think that now, that role at other facilities was it's similar. I don't think that Retreat is unique in that I think that a lot of facilities also have that as a role. Now the state also requires you to follow up with your patients after they leave for continuity to make sure that they are doing okay.

Steve Martorano  
That's just that's a licensing requirement. I didn't know that. Yeah. Follow up. Follow along. There's a follow-up plan. How long does the follow-up list?

Maggie Hunt  
In Pennsylvania, I will say we are required to follow up at least on 7...30..seven days, and 30 days, Retreat follows up at 7, 30 90, 6 months, and a year.

Steve Martorano  
Wow. So there is that legal requirement, which is both wise and, you know, keeps everybody safe. But it plays nicely into the alumni group because that fulfills that function right there. How large a group do you have at this point?

Maggie Hunt  
Well, currently, it's it's kind of vast because we've had different staff members who've taken over the positions. We've had different communities that have been stronger than others. We've tried different things, we've succeeded really well at different things, we've maybe had different challenges. In Connecticut, they currently are running a virtual group exclusively. In Florida, they are running more of a veteran's stronger group than they are in person doing. In Pennsylvania, we recently stopped running our in-person groups, because we kind of lost the momentum that we had both Grace and Lindsay, who were doing alumni both went on maternity leave at the same time. So we kind of lost some ammunition with like people that were kind of coming. So we currently stopped our weekly alumni meetings, because we wanted to kind of have larger quarterly events. So we're going to do larger quarterly events instead of weekly alumni meetings, just because they're not 12-step meetings. So we want to have bigger events.

Steve Martorano  
I wanted to ask you about that as well. But you could tell from Maggie's description, you know, to be perfectly honest with you guys, we talked about I mean, you're great partners, editorially, you guys give me control, I pick the stuff. And I don't think I've ever heard back like Steve, you shouldn't have interviewed that person. So we have real freedom here with our underwriting partner Retreat. And I'll be brutally honest, it's not an infomercial, Retreat, or, you know, we run spots and all that, we don't spend enough time talking about Retreat, we really don't. Because it's I mean, I've seen it now for 10 or 12 years now and watch this thing grow and get bigger. And as you heard from Maggie, they have facilities now in southern Connecticut, and are in southern New England and Connecticut, they have their home headquarters in West Palm, which is an unbelievable facility down there. And, of course, the Lancaster County facilities here in Pennsylvania, and a look again, I know they are my partners in this thing, but they're world-class, these people care, and they do a great job. So I'm glad to have this opportunity. And I want to talk a little bit more about Retreat in a blatantly obvious way. They are my partners, and they're good people, and they do great work. So let's talk about Retreat a little bit. Before we do that, though, the difference between an alumni group and a 12-step meeting, is it is it isn't an alumni group therapeutic or just social.

Maggie Hunt 
It probably has the capacity for both, I would definitely say that it is social, it is run by Retreat staff. So it is not. It is not a patient-run or alumni-run completely exclusively by itself. Therefore, like if there was a therapeutic component, or if there was some type of crisis intervention, or if there was some type of situation that came up there is always staff there. That is not you know, it doesn't it does not fully self-supporting Retreat staff support that experience. They support the event. So because of that, it is not, you know, exclusively on its own.

Steve Martorano  
No. And I see it a couple of the agendas that you guys put together are a real family affair. It's not just the people who've gone through Retreat. It's them in their families, right?

Maggie Hunt  
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, we definitely are welcome. We try to not have children that are there under, like, 16, 17, you know, I mean, sometimes people will have to bring small children, if they have to bring small children, we try to keep it so that like they can't fully understand what's going on at the meeting. Just because we don't want them to hear things where people curse in the meeting, etc. If they are, maybe they're adolescents, maybe they're struggling in their adolescence and they're there with their parents, then then we're okay with that. But if they are at kind of like an age where they might hear kind of some questionable things, we try to avoid that a little bit. Plus for liability purposes, however, you know, if they are 17, you know, 16 17, 18, and they need to be like at a support meeting we're okay with that. But, yeah, they can bring their spouse you know, it is a recovery-based meeting. It is not a 12-step, fellowship. 12-Step Fellowships are fully self-supporting financially, and they pay the rent for the location. They have their own rules and regulations. Well, I won't I don't want to say rules. They have their own traditions, and they have their own program that they follow.

Steve Martorano  
Yeah, there's almost you spent any time at all looking at AA as an organization and that's a strange word to apply to them. You will probably find no other large organization, I'll use the word again, that is so decentralized. It is an utterly, utterly without a hierarchy. And so it's all decentralized. It's all self-starting. It's an amazing process AA I just wanted to make sure people understood the distinction between an alumni group and a 12-step meeting. So great. I mean, the alum, I just think the alumni thing is great. I mean, the idea, I can understand people having fun memories, and maybe not so fond memories of being in a treatment facility. But it says something about, let's go back, you know, it's like, let's go back because this was basically saved my life. So I love the idea of the alumni group in that context, I want to spend some time because as I said, you've done just about everything there is to do at different levels with Retreat, how long have you been with them? Now?

Maggie Hunt  
I have been with Retreat for 12 and a half years.

Steve Martorano  
Yeah, that's fantastic. And so I want you to spend some time explaining to people how you wind up with the right facility for you know, Retreat began, almost exclusively a drug and alcohol treatment. There is of course, even in that context, some mental health treatment that goes on. And then down the road a bit, you develop the synergy program, which is a standalone mental health service, that Retreat also provides that you can avail yourself of without being addicted to drugs or alcohol. It all comes under the umbrella of behavioral health. So if somebody's out there going, "Okay, I've got a problem with regard to my behavioral health." What do they what should they look for first, when searching for a facility?

Maggie Hunt  
The first thing I usually say to family is if you know someone who has been to a facility that is great. However, it is important if you have insurance to check to see who your insurance is in network with because that is going to be who your funding sources. Typically, you want to find an in-network insurance provider because that is going to make your cost low that is going to keep your deductible low. Your insurance usually has preferred providers, that are going to say, okay, these are who we are, this is who we are in a partnership, this is who we are going to pay for. And this is a guarantee that we're going to pay for it. This is who your employers have, you know, your employers have picked us as your insurance. And this is who we're picking as preferred providers, the same thing as it would for like a PCP, like if you have a PCP and this you know, use your PCP is in a network like you want to go to that PCP because that's in a network. And it's like, similar to the same thing. If you choose an out-of-network insurance provider you run the risk of it not being paid for. And so in that case, Retreat is an in-network insurance provider for almost all major insurance companies. And that's, you know, it doesn't if you're looking for insurance, if you're looking for a facility doesn't necessarily have to be Retreat, as you know, but you know, I would just choose, you know, I would tell myself and as a family member, like look for an in-network insurance provider, because that's who's going to pay for it for you know, insurance, treatment is a hefty cost. And if you have insurance, you should use your insurance to pay for treatment, especially if it's in the network. If you go to Google, you are going to find the top search as whoever has paid the most for whatever keyword you searched that day. So you may try to find a close facility in your area, however, the internet is going to target you because drug and alcohol treatment centers also is a business. So, therefore, they are going to be looking to continue, they want to provide a good service for you. They want to...every treatment center wants to provide a service and they want to stay in business. And it is a difficult business to stay in. And they want to provide the best quality of care. However, they are also trying to fill their beds too. So they are going to want to stay on the top of your mind. So therefore they're going to pay the top dollar to stay on the top of that list. So when you Google in your area, treatment centers in wherever you're going to find a place in California, Florida, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, wherever, whoever is going to pay the most for whatever that key term is. And that's where you're going to find you're going to click that because you're going to think that that's where you are, and you're going to search, this website is going to look beautiful, and it's going to have all the things that you want, and then you're going to call them they're gonna be like we're in Texas, and then they're gonna be like, but we'll pay for your flight to come out here and that is number one red flag. If you find a facility that says that we're going to pay for your flight -- hang up the phone, because that's an unethical practice. That's an unethical practice that was at one time ethical. At one time was seen as an okay thing but it's now seen as enticement because that is enticement to say like, you know, you should as a human being, you know, be able to pick your own facility and go to your own facility and if it It is seen as enticement, if a facility says that they will pay for your flight to go there. And I'm not saying that places, you know, at one time did not do that because they did. However, in 2023. It is seen as enticement if you are paying for flights to go to...

Steve Martorano 
That's a great piece of information because I wouldn't have thought that I could tell. And I understand the Google thing. I mean, we all now think that finding the answers to anything is a key, you know, keyboard away just punching Google and Google will tell you. Well, it will in lots of cases. But your point about all this enticement, and getting closer to what you really need, I tell people all the time to words, in any search, that are crucial, or "near me." So you know, you put in you know, anything, you'll get one in Vienna, so you'll get one in Austria, put it near me, it's going to narrow the search down. But it doesn't give you the full answer. Because as you say, everybody is trying to move up on the Google search, I guess the best thing to do is to read outside what's paid for read articles about treatment. And you're right, most people know other people who have been there and done that. And referrals are probably the best way to choose a place.

Maggie Hunt  
Yeah, but I also don't think that Google reviews are always the best thing. Because I know, like, oftentimes, a Google review is, you know, especially in drug and alcohol treatment, most people get sober, have a good experience, and then they go live their life, a lot of the reviews that we get are oftentimes people who have had a terrible experience, and then they go back to leave the review to try to, you know, like, stick it to us. And it works. You know, I mean, it works. They, you know, that's well...

Steve Martorano  
It works across the board. Restaurants and restauranteurs have been complaining about this forever, one bad experience, and they condemn the entire operation. So ya know, you can have any opinion about anything you want validated by looking on a search engine for reviews, there will be reviews that agree with you, and there will be others that won't you just ignore those. So you really got to talk to people who've been there, I guess. But, it is interesting that you talk about making the first stop your insurance provider, finding out what you're covered for, I guess, generally speaking, insurance companies are not in the business of underwriting health care, with organizations that don't do a real good job. So it's also a way of going with my insurance company says they're okay. Maybe they're okay. And all the licensing and educational requirements that exist, I'm sure a Retreat complies with Correct, correct?

Maggie Hunt  
Absolutely, yeah, absolutely. And if you don't have insurance, if you don't have insurance, go to your state's website, because every state currently has a drug and alcohol department, or drug and alcohol county commissioner for your local counties, that is providing resources that are able to get you into treatment. So especially now with the Purdue pharma, like money funds that are being allocated to, you know, to helping people get into treatment, that is being dispersed to different states. So you can find, you can find resources in that way, but go to the local drug and alcohol department programs, local county, your you know, local, local counties have funds through a single county authority. And then also, the State Department for that state also has like ability to be able to get you assistance through the government to get insurance as well, if you don't have insurance. So there's you know, I understand that it might be difficult, and you may not be able to get into treatment that day, however, there is a bit like treatment is out there and you are able to get treatment.

Steve Martorano  
Yeah, yeah. And money...money should be it's a concern, no doubt, but it shouldn't stop anybody. Because you're right. There are billions of dollars sloshing around there from the settlements, and it's there. So go look. I've always said this about treatment. And you said it perfectly. It's out there. They don't deliver it though. You know, you gotta you gotta go, you gotta go get it. And finally, this is with regard to a place like Retreat Behavioral Health. What is the distinct you are not a psych hospital? You are not a psychiatric hospital. What's the difference between a place like Retreat and a psychiatric hospital?

Maggie Hunt  
Yep. So Retreat is a is a mental health residential treatment center. So it would be it's a resident adult residential treatment center. So a psychotic But all would be for an acute...is an acute psychiatric facility and we are unmet mental health residential. So an acute psych would be someone who has an active plan to harm themselves, Retreat would be somebody who does not have an active plan. So if you have an active plan to harm yourself or someone else, or you have an active plan, or you are much more at risk than we can handle because especially at Retreat, we are not a locked unit. And so if we are a large campus, and so safety is our number one concern. So we would definitely do a psych evaluation to make sure that due to our inability to be a locked unit, and our large campus, we cannot, that we would that you would be most safe at the facility. There are certain requirements and regulations that being the facility that we are and through that Pennsylvania, and Florida because we're licensed for mental health and just Pennsylvania and Florida, not in Connecticut, that we can adhere to all the guidelines. Now, for someone who struggles with, you know, some people are struggling with mental health. Some people you know, worry about, I want to get mental health treatment, but I don't need a locked unit. I'm struggling, I don't really I want to be on a medication, I don't want to be on a medication at home, because I'm worried about some of the side effects. But I don't want to be in a locked unit that would be like somebody who would come to Retreat, or somebody who, you know, is like struggling to be at home, I can't get out of bed you know, having a hard time showering, I just like can't function in like some of my daily life things because I you know, but I need to be removed from my situation. But I don't want to harm myself, that would be somebody who would be like a candidate for some to come to Retreat. We are still a short-term facility. So that's what I think that people also have to remember as well. So we are not like a long-term care option either. So if there is an extensive long-term mental health history, we may not also be the right level of care either because we are such a short-term facility. And so that would be like, you know like an acute psych facility might not be the right level of care either, because mental health is very complex. So it's definitely determined, it depends on what the situation is, the way that it would work would be if they were at an acute psych facility, and then they needed to step down, we would be a good option for a step down from an acute psych facility down to that. Or if somebody was experiencing a mental health crisis, but did not have an emergent plan, then they could come to us. If they were in a state of psychosis, we would not be the right thing for them.

Steve Martorano  
I understand and you're right. It's like it's very much like the situation with drug and alcohol treatment, it is not one thing it is a process. So you have to find out where your problems fit along that continuum and then put your...

Maggie Hunt  
...and we are in a voluntary facility. We are...

Steve Martorano  
That is that is a final distinction. I mean everyone that can avail themselves of Retreat services is there voluntarily as opposed to a psych hospital where you can be replaced involuntarily. Thanks, Maggie Hunt from Retreat Behavioral Health are a great partner. Hey, you guys. Thanks. Don't forget to follow us like us and do the whole thing. On Facebook and Instagram, we're everywhere. Behavioral Corner. See you next time.

Retreat Behavioral Health  
Retreat Behavioral Health has proudly been serving the community for over ten years. Here at Retreat, we believe in the power of connection and quality care. We offer comprehensive, holistic, and compassionate treatment from industry-leading experts. Call 855-802-6600 or visit us at www.retreatbehavioralhealth.com to begin your journey today.

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