Eating Recovery Center Relocates, Expands Denver Eating Disorder Treatment Center for Children and Adolescents

DENVER, CO (NOVEMBER 13, 2019) - Eating Recovery Center (ERC), the nation’s leading provider of best-in-class treatment of eating disorders and mental health conditions, has announced its newly relocated treatment center for its Denver Child and Adolescent Program, now open on the Saint Joseph Hospital campus downtown. The state-of-the-art treatment center increases capacity for its residential level of care by 50% in order to meet the growing demand for treatment of patients of all gender identities ages 10-17. Additionally, with 85% of patients coming to ERC from outside of Colorado, the new location’s proximity to the Ronald McDonald House Charities of Denver, now just a short walk away, offers convenience and comfort for families supporting their loved ones through treatment.

The expansion and relocation of ERC’s Child and Adolescent Program comes in response to the increased need for quality services amid a growing mental health crisis across the country. It also allows ERC to bring the program under one roof, supporting a seamless continuity of care as patients transition from Inpatient and Residential services, now with 36 beds available (up from 24 at the prior location), to Partial Hospitalization services, with 16-20 slots (up from 12).

“With the expansion of our Child and Adolescent Program, we’re aiming to address the increasing need for quality services, at all levels of care, for our most vulnerable patients,” says Elizabeth Easton, PsyD, CEDS, Regional Clinical Director of Child and Adolescent Services, Colorado. “The need has already been proven, as we’re at about 80% capacity within the first few weeks of opening. The expanded capacity, together with our unmatched clinical expertise and treatment capabilities, helps alleviate the challenge facing families and healthcare providers looking for the best place to help their young patients struggling to recover from eating disorders.”

Innovative features of ERC’s relocated, expanded treatment center include:

• An Intensive Treatment Unit (ITU): Offers a ‘program within a program’ for patients with significant medical and/or behavioral needs who require a slower introduction to the more complex ‘main unit’ program. 
• Dedicated family treatment areas: Expanded treatment spaces accommodate robust family engagement, including family therapy, multi-family therapy groups and skill building/practice, including a separate dining area to support family meals and multi-family meals.
• Enhanced continuity of care: Inpatient, Residential and Partial Hospitalization programs are housed in a single treatment center, fostering consistency in the team treating patients and their families, approach, interventions and location. This consistency limits anxiety associated with transitions and allows patients and families to build upon clinical trust and recovery skills as treatment progresses.
• Enhanced treatment capability of Avoidant Restrictive Food Intake Disorder (ARFID): Within the framework of a specialized treatment protocol for ARFID, the new treatment center offers dedicated spaces for patients with sensory concerns and creative exposures to new food types/groups, as well as anxiety management for eating and comprehensive support for meeting growth needs.

The 76,000 square-foot, 36-bed treatment center is located at 1830 Franklin Street and occupies a portion of the 4th floor and the full 5th floor of the Saint Joseph ancillary building.

In addition to its new Denver treatment center, ERC provides specialized eating disorder treatment for children, adolescents and families at 30 locations in seven states across the country, including Colorado, California, Illinois, Ohio, South Carolina, Texas and Washington.

ERC’s former locations housing the Child and Adolescent Program in Denver’s Lowry neighborhood will become the treatment center for Pathlight Behavioral Health Centers, which specializes in treatment for mood, anxiety and trauma-related disorders. Starting in December, Pathlight will bring its best-in-class treatment programs to Colorado with programs for adults, teens and children.

In early 2020, Pathlight will be offering a dedicated residential center to treat mood and anxiety disorders in children and teens. Learn more at www.InsightBHC.com.

# # #

About Eating Recovery Center
Eating Recovery Center (ERC) is the only national, vertically integrated, health care system dedicated to the treatment of serious eating and related disorders at any stage of the illness. ERC offers best-in-class treatment programs for all patients, no matter their age or gender, struggling from: anorexia, bulimia, binge eating disorder, eating and weight disorder, unspecified eating disorders, as well as comorbid, co-occurring and dual diagnoses. Led by the world’s leading experts in eating disorder treatment, ERC provides a full spectrum of eating disorder recovery services through an unmatched network of multiple locations across seven states.