Riverview Psychiatric Center

Riverview Psychiatric Center, also known as Riverview Psychiatric Recovery Center, formerly the Augusta Mental Health Institute and the Augusta State Hospital, is a psychiatric hospital in Augusta, Maine, operated by the Maine Department of Health and Human Services. The center recruits for volunteers from the United Way for certain services.HistoryModern psychiatric hospitals evolved from, and eventually replaced, the older lunatic asylums. The development of the modern psychiatric hospital is also the story of the rise of organised, institutional psychiatry. In the 19th century, institutionalisation was found to be the "correct solution" to the problem of "madness".In 1834, the Maine Legislature established the Maine Insane Hospital, and together with private donations, state appropriations enabled the hospital to open in 1840.From 1946 to 1962, Dr. Francis Harper Sleeper (1900-1983) served as the superintendent, and his name lent itself to the Sleeper Era, a period of several changes to services, including "unitary control" of nursing, hiring of an additional psychologist and interns, hiring of a pharmacist and a dentist, and creation of a library with a librarian. From the late 1940s through the early 1960s, "the hospital experienced extensive over-crowding." In the 1960s, a new superintendent, Dr. John C. Patterson, mandated discharge of patients to support their rights (as opposed to leaves of absence), which raised admissions, yet, "the population began to drop because of use of new medications."