Stream It Or Skip It: ‘One South: Portrait Of A Psych Unit’ On HBO, A Docuseries About A Psych Unit For College Kids Who Are Having Mental Health Issues

One South: Portrait Of A Psych Unit is a two-part docuseries that shows the patients and caregivers in the “One South” ward of the Northwell Zucker Hillside Hospital in Queens, New York. The program at One South is the only one in the country that caters exclusively to college students, and they have partnered with dozens of area colleges, who recommend the program to students who they identify as having mental health problems.

ONE SOUTH: PORTRAIT OF A PSYCH UNIT: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: We pan down from the view of a blue sky, to a view of it from what looks like a hospital window.

The Gist: The patients that are shown on camera have all agreed to let their treatment be shown, though some have had their faces digitally altered. Many have had suicidal thoughts, and have suffered through some severe anxiety attacks along with the ideation that life was no longer worth living. The idea of what the staff tries to do is to give them some tools to manage their illness as they reenter their lives and get outpatient treatment; most stays last 7 to 10 days.

The treatment, which involves individual sessions with psychiatrists and therapists, along with medication and group therapy, also involves mindfulness exercises like using scents to help people focus. The main treatment used is Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), which has been shown to work with young adults, especially those buckling under the pressures involved with being in college. It gives these young adults the tools they need to manage intense emotions and navigate social relationships in those who have borderline personality disorder and a number of other psychiatric conditions, and ease the suicidal impulses that may come with these illnesses.

During the first episode, we hear from a student that came to the ward after ODing, one that has had a hard time dealing with her disability, and one that “thinks she’s gotten all the treatment she needs,” according to Dr. Jason Yan, who leads the daily patient briefing. We also see Dr. Laura Braider, Assistant VP, College Program, field a call during a meeting with reps from a local college because a patient needs to be admitted and there were no beds available. The staff also has to go all hands on deck when an off-camera patient gets violent when she doesn’t get the medication she wants.

Photo: HBO

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? The format of One South: Portrait Of A Psych Unit, produced and directed by Alexandra Shiva and Lindsey Megrue, has a similar format to Emergency: NYC and Lenox Hill.

Our Take: One South: Portrait Of A Psych Unit is an unsparing look at what goes on in a unit that’s geared towards young adults, especially college students. As a graphic at the beginning of the episode points out, 1 in 10 young adults are diagnosed with a serious mental illness, which makes the fact that One South is the only program in the country dedicated to college students remarkable to contemplate.

As we see from the patients who agreed to be on camera, these young adults aren’t there because of some some sort of minor issue; they’re not just “blue” or getting down over a bad grade or relationship breakup. Many of these patients have seriously thought about suicide; in the case of 19-year-old Joey, he literally stood on the George Washington Bridge and contemplated jumping in the Hudson River right before he arrived at the ward. Courtney has BPD and has trouble regulating her emotions; on top of that, she feels she has no one in her life to provide emotional support.

These are serious illnesses, and while the doctors and therapists wish they could do more, their goal is to stabilize those thoughts of self-harm and other impulses so the patients can go back to their lives and receive treatment. You can see in the eyes of all of the staff how dedicated they are to the unit’s mission, but how utterly gutted they get with the intensity of their work.

It goes without saying that the patients that agreed to be shown on camera — even those that had their faces digitally altered — should be lauded for their courage. While they seem to be resistant to what the caregivers are asking them to do, the fact that they’re there and even willing to listen a little bit shows that they’re at the point where they acknowledge that they want to get better.

The other aspect of the series that will be examined is the support the patients give each other, both via group therapy and informal conversations in the ward’s common areas. Often, this is the only support some of these patients have gotten in years, and it is part of how the caregivers treat people who come there at the lowest points in their young lives.

Sex and Skin: None.

Parting Shot: After sedating the patient who was getting violent, Dr. Rachel Reich and Dr. Yan discuss whether they should have acted sooner. Then they turn the lights off in the ward to help the rest of the patients de-stress from their exposure to the incident.

Sleeper Star: Dr. Rachel Reich, who is a psychologist in the unit, is shown skillfully getting even the most recalcitrant patients to open up to the point where she can get an idea of what brought them there.

Most Pilot-y Line: None we could find.

Our Call: STREAM IT. Not only does One South: Portrait Of A Psych Unit show just how serious mental illness among college students can be, it shows the effectiveness of treatment that’s designed for these kinds of patients.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.

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