Rogers Memorial Hospital Foundation receives $2.5M gift; officials say, "It's really an important and crucial time"

OCONOMOWOC (WITI) -- Thanks to a big donation, more young adults in our area will be able to get treatment for mental health issues. Rogers Memorial Hospital Foundation has received a donation of $2.5 million from Dr. Michael Kubly and Mrs. Billie Kubly.

The donation will support expansion of the FOCUS residential program which treats young adults with depression and mood disorders who are having difficulty transitioning into adulthood. Additionally, the donation will help develop a transitional living facility for these young adults, and contribute toward research for a computer-based treatment tool for depression.

"It`s really an important and crucial time to be able to realize these disorders are going on, and find them and treat them," said Jerry Halverson, MD, medical director for Rogers’ FOCUS program and adult services.

Currently, the FOCUS program is at capacity. Rogers plans to increase the program’s census at its Oconomowoc facility, and will rename it the Charles E. Kubly FOCUS Center, in memory of the Kublys’ youngest son who suffered from depression before taking his own life.

"We are going to be expanding from 24 beds to 33 beds," said says Patrick Hammer, president and CEO of Rogers Behavioral Health System.

In addition, the Kubly gift will support the building of a new transitional living facility which will provide FOCUS residents with a step-down treatment option where residents continue to receive coordinated, personalized treatment, medication monitoring and career counseling.The new facility will be named the Charles E. Kubly Transition House. A timeline for developing this new facility is currently under review.

"It does not exist in this state. There are a lot of transitional levels for folks that have addiction issues -- that is the model that is better known," said  Dr. Halverson.

The Kubly donation will also enable Rogers to expand its attention modification research to further encompass depression in its clinical studies.

Rogers, in cooperation with San Diego State University, has been conducting clinical research using a computer-based software treatment tool known as attention retraining (AR). AR attempts to retrain a person’s attention away from things they find threatening and onto things they consider neutral leading to significant reductions in anxiety symptoms.

"It really re-trains the brain on how we think about different stressful issues," said Hammer.