The facility that treated addictions in Estevan from 1991 until 1997 is ready to do so again soon. The St. Joseph's Addiction Recovery Centre held its grand opening Thursday morning with provincial Health Minister Jim Rieter, local MLA Lori Carr, Mayor Roy Ludwig, and members of St. Joseph's Hospital and the committee that helped bring the centre back to life all in attendance.

The facility has 15 beds for those recovering from crystal meth addictions, another five beds for those with other addictions, six beds for those who have finished their treatments, and another four as sort of an overflow for those waiting to receive treatment while the other beds in the facility are still occupied.

A large factor in the facility is that the treatment for each patient is going to be tailored to each individual receiving treatment which is thanks to advice that Minister of Health Jim Reiter received from the experts.

"Addictions people, counselors, experts that I've talked to over the past few years have all indicated to me that what worked for other addictions doesn't necessarily work for crystal meth and it's so important that it has its own type of treatment, it's own structure. The treatment here is going to be individualized. The traditional treatment is 28 days, that won't be the case here. It will be much more customized."

Director of Support Services Mark Pettitt shows government officials and media the inside of the facility, starting with the open dining area.

The province has been looking to build an addictions facility specific to crystal meth for a number of years now and everything seemed to fall into place when St. Joseph's Hospital approached them to fund a facility of their own. The facility being used is the original addictions facility that operated in the 1990s before being shut down by the previous government, and without the building in place, this project would have cost the province a lot more to bring it out here to the point that it may not have happened. 

"We had had some discussions about the need for something specific to crystal meth, and when Greg (Hoffort) and St. Joseph's Hospital reached out for (an addictions facility), it just seemed like the perfect fit at the perfect time. Without that, without their support, we wouldn't be in this position yet so we're very appreciative that we can move this along this quickly."

As for what this means for Estevan specifically, 15 more jobs are here in our city because of this, and four of the doctors in Estevan are going to be helping with the facility when there are medical needs. Two of those doctors are some of Estevan's newest, and Hospital Executive Director Greg Hoffort says that this facility will be a factor in both recruitment and retention.

"For physicians and the community the more services we can offer closer to home is something that really excites us, but it is a part of physician recruitment. We have a lot of new physicians here recently and some of them, like the two young physicians Dr Garcia and Dr, Cormier are both very excited to be a part of this."

Each room has three beds to a room with a desk and closet space. The beds are home beds, not hospital beds, as patients could be staying for long periods of time.

The renovations to the facility are not quite complete with things such as fencing around the outside of the building for privacy, but those details are soon to be finished. Most of the hiring in the clinical aspect of the addictions centre has been completed as well, but a few positions are to be filled over the next week.

The facility is meant to give more of a welcoming, homey vibe as patients go through their recovery journey, and so it wasn't just local contractors doing all the work in the facility either. Everything from community quilters from Redvers putting together quilts for beds, hospital members themselves built displays that are being used in the building, and other community members made sure they could help out in any way they could.

"The community has reached out greatly to see what and where they can help. The local effort to get this place ready, a lot of people have done amazing work to get us the things we needed in short order and a lot of people have been reaching out to see what they can do and we'll have more to discuss on that in the future."

The addictions centre should be ready to go for the start of October to see it's first patients as they slowly phase in towards full capacity, which they hope to achieve by the end of the year. Many of the clinical workers have already been in their own bubble as they have trained to work at the facility, and so the staff will be ready as soon as the doors open to the first patient.