North Texas State Hospital

Texas' state psychiatric hospitals, including one in Terrell, now ...

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The North Texas State Hospital (NTSH) is an inpatient mental health facility owned by the State of Texas and under the Texas Department of State Health Services. NTSH has two campuses, in Wichita Falls and Vernon.

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Wichita Falls campus

The Wichita Falls campus is a 330-bed facility that exists to treat people with mental illnesses and mental retardation after being screened by a local mental health facility (generally, a hospital or community mental health/mental retardation facility). It is Medicare certified. Although not a maximum security facility, the campus is guarded, and buildings (which are not guarded) are constantly locked with very limited access.The facility used to be open until a few years ago before the merge with formally Vernon State Hospital. Wichita Falls State Hospital was the name since 1922 and Vernon was added as an annex in the 1960s. Since the merge and the approx. $100,000 name change the hospital has become much more restricted and no longer an open campus.

Maps North Texas State Hospital

Vernon campus

The Vernon campus has 284 adult beds and 78 adolescent beds. It is a maximum-security facility that services both adults with criminal (forensic) issues and adolescents with dually-diagnosed substance abuse and mental health problems most of whom are there as a condition of their probation, having had significant involvement with the juvenile justice system.

The Vernon campus was mandated by the 70th Texas Legislature to provide services to six populations:

Persons with felony charges who have been found incompetent to stand trial;
Persons admitted for pre-trial evaluations for competency and issues of insanity;
Persons found not guilty by reason of insanity;
Persons from other state hospitals who have been found to be manifestly dangerous;
Mentally disabled persons who have been found incompetent to stand trial on misdemeanor or felony charges;
Persons from the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) and other jails who need inpatient psychiatric hospitalization. [The hospital has never been asked to fulfill this mandate as TDCJ developed its own psychiatric services.]