Rock the Foundation is Tacoma’s concert for a cause. The annual fundraiser, produced by MultiCare Health Foundation, includes dinner and a private concert. This year’s headliner is rising country music star Joe Nichols. This year’s cause? A new behavioral health community hospital for Pierce County.
One in five adults lives with behavioral health illness, and the effects are felt by the entire family. When the family can’t find adequate care for their loved one, they feel as if their world is falling apart. This is a situation that, for decades, has been the shared experience of many families in Pierce County.
Pierce County ranks at the very bottom of urban counties in Washington for inpatient psychiatric capacity, with only 2.8 beds per 100,000 people. The national average is 26.1 beds. Families throughout Pierce County are suffering because of this severe lack of access to care. Emergency departments are overcrowded because people have nowhere else to turn in a crisis. Law enforcement, first responders and members of the justice system divert an incredible amount of time and resources to addressing this behavioral health crisis.
Now there is hope.
CHI Franciscan Health and MultiCare Health System, two major health care providers in Pierce County, will jointly build and operate a 120-bed behavioral health hospital in Tacoma that will serve approximately 5,000 adult patients a year.
Rock the Foundation 2017 will support the new hospital and help bring hope and recovery to South Puget Sound area families.
Rock the Foundation 2017 takes place Saturday, Sept. 23, at the Greater Tacoma Convention Center. For more information, visit rockthefoundation.org. MAURA HALLAM