MANSFIELD, Ohio – After 41 years of caring for patients and evolving OhioHealth Mansfield Hospital’s Behavioral Health Unit, the behavioral health director of Mansfield Hospital and OhioHealth Marion General Hospital is retiring.
Jody Allton LISW-S, LCDC3 has seen a lot of change in the 41 years she’s worked at Mansfield Hospital. For starters, back when she started as a social worker in 1984, policies were much different.
“I remember rounding with physicians and they smoked as they went in and out of patients’ rooms,” said Allton.
She also remembers the average length of stay for patients being double the time it is today. Back then, Allton says patients typically stayed 10-14 days. Now, the average stay is between 5-7 days.
Allton says decades later, things look a lot different. Not just within the hospital, but within the behavioral health unit.
In the early 90’s, Allton and the behavioral health team were asked to develop an adolescent psych unit. They worked with Mansfield City Schools to provide a tutor for students and a school program. Now, nearly 40 years later, both the adolescent unit and a tutor from Mansfield City Schools remain. Mansfield Hospital continues to be the only hospital within OhioHealth to have an adolescent unit within their behavioral health unit.
"It speaks volumes about the administrative team and how supportive they are of behavioral health services,” said Allton.
Just recently, the behavioral health unit was redesigned to better meet some unique patient needs. According to Allton, all adolescents now have private, single occupancy rooms. The change addresses some adolescent patients’ struggles with sexual identity issues.
‘I chose behavioral health’
While Allton wasn’t always sure she wanted to work in a hospital, she always knew she was interested in helping people. She earned her bachelor’s degree in psychiatry at The College of Wooster and her master’s degree from The Ohio State University. Allton’s first job was running the intake unit at a youth camp for delinquent boys. She later worked at Sobriety House, a halfway house in Mansfield for teens and adults. She was hired as a social worker at Mansfield General three years later.
While at the hospital, her responsibilities quickly grew. In addition to being a social worker for the behavioral health unit, she was also a social worker/pre-screener for the emergency department. Eventually, she became the manager of the social work department, on top of her psychiatric social work role. Around 1998, Allton was promoted to director of behavioral health and social work for the hospital and took on case management as well. She did that for nearly 20 years, until she was asked to commit to case management or behavioral health.
“I decided that I started my career in behavioral health, so I was going to end my career in behavioral health,” said Allton.
Allton also later became the director of behavioral health at Marion General Hospital, and eventually the director of the intensive outpatient program at Marion General.
A Community Advocate
While Allton has made a lasting impact on the behavioral health unit at Mansfield Hospital, her work outside the hospital is just as impressive.
Over the last few decades, Allton’s been involved in countless community groups in Richland, Ashland, Marion, Knox and Crawford Counties.
In Richland County alone, Allton is on the Crisis Intervention Team Advisory, helped to establish the Assisted Outpatient Treatment Program, and was a major contributor in forming the Opiate Board.
“We have seen a huge reduction in overdoses in our community because of that program [Opiate Board],” said Allton.
Allton also still has one year left in her term as a board member for the Chamber of Commerce in Ashland County and was the former chair. She plans to go to more Chamber events this year with her new time.
When Allton isn’t continuing to give back to her community, she plans to spend more time with children and first grandchild in Charleston, South Carolina and Statesville, North Carolina.
Her last day at Mansfield and Marion General Hospitals is October 3rd. She says she looks forward to watching the behavioral health teams continue to remain an integral component of care for behavioral health patients in Richland, Marion, and surrounding counties.