River Vista Behavioral Health - Madera, California

Jose C.

Provider parent communication does not happen even when parents call several days in a row. Commits insurance fraud by keeping stable patients for a minimum of a week longer than needed. Reception Juanita smith to be very specific, is unhelpful and withholding permanent info regarding who is providing care for my child. Dr Brar doesn't respond back to messages, calls and requests to speak to her. No accountability, parent updates and his forbid they answer the phone.i would highly recommend looking at any place other than river vista.

Jose C.

Facility refuses to give parents of a minor updates. Requested to speak to charge nurse, director and Dr Brar. Never received a call back. Poor continuity of care, and concerning as it appears they are just babysitting adolescents for money and not treatment

Autumn V.

This is a last resort for someone in serious danger who needs to be watched. Make sure you have family and other care providers standing by on the outside to advocate for your rights and care. Hard to do in a crisis.

It's not a place where someone can get the care proportionate to their mental health needs. The cookie cutter intake process will not account for mental and medical history, medication prescriptions, or existing care outside this facility. The existence of conditions like autism and other psychological factors come as a surprise to the staff and even the doctors. Connecting patients to their history of care is not a priority.

The overworked and understaffed team of care providers are too busy to do more than the barest minimum for the patients. To be clear, they are mostly nice people. The fault is with the management of the institution.

Paying staff to uphold a higher standard is going to cut into the bottom line: profit. And since staff are not paid livable wages, why bother training them to perform at a higher standard of care? No point, they are there for a while and leave to better places. Result? Confusion, disillusionment, ambivalence. No one knows what's going on or how anything works. No one can afford to care.

The doctors will not make one patient a priority. They don't have the time or the incentive. It is easier to hold you for 14 days or more and hope you get the right meds and not someone else's.

This is a facility with one function only: suicide watch. Even then you may want to seek help somewhere else.

Daniel E.

DO NOT LET YOUR LOVED ONES GO HERE. They don’t monitor patient interactions at all. Patients constantly hooking up and coordinating drug sales internally. If your loved ones go here, they will NOT be helped and will only end up on a worse place.

Vvb G.

If you are a loved one this place makes it difficult to get information. Every other place my loved one has received treatment at made it easy to get updates. Other places ask the patient if there is anyone they would like to know they are receiving treatment and would they like to provide treatment updates. This place requires a patient passcode, a code the patient has to call you to provide. My loved one doesn’t have ppl’s phone numbers memorized! So if someone gets treatment there and they don’t have ppl’s phone numbers memorized they are just SOL. I can’t imagine how many patients got released from there with nobody to pick them up because of the stupid passcode. Just do like everyone else and ASK the patient for NAMES of ppl authorized to receive information!!!!!

Sharon S.

Unfortunately, during a traumatic time in my life, I ended up being a patient at this facility. While some of the staff were truly kind and passionate about their jobs, the majority were rude, disrespectful, dismissive, and lacked empathy. I witnessed multiple occurrences in which patients were spoken to harshly and openly made fun of between staff members. The facility is grossly understaffed making for an extremely chaotic and inefficient program. All patients have to ask for water because it was not readily available, staff would often act as if the request was a burden. "I don't know" , "give me 20 minutes", and "that's not my job, go ask so and so" were a constant when we either needed something or needed to talk to someone. The staff openly complained about their jobs and cussed constantly. They spoke so loud to each other and to us that the environment was the opposite of conducive to healing. They often shouted to each other as they walked the halls at night as we tried to sleep and we weren't allowed to close our doors to muffle the sound. The beds and pillows were painfully uncomfortable and it was always unbearably cold. The food was haled as being healthy, but it was actually just tiny portions of disgusting tasting and looking concoctions. One on one therapy or assistance is non-existent. The upper administration (psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers, etc.) seemed adamant in their diagnoses and treatment plans without much investigation or input from the patients. Overall, my experience was not helpful at all and speaking with my roommate, she confided in me that she felt like she was slipping further into her depression due to the subpar program. All in all, I would warn people to avoid this facility if at all possible.

Moon J.

Dr. Singh recorded false information on my intake form, mis-prescribed medication, and was extremely dismissive and avoidant when confronted about his mistakes. He literally said "Well it doesn't matter now, does it?" If you visit this facility, do whatever you can to be assigned a different psychiatrist.

I'd like to add that this is not a place where people receive help. I'm fairly certain the incompetent staff switched info on my chart somehow with another patient, the way I was treated. I was actually handed a cup for a UA and only after collecting my sample, did I notice it had another patients name on it. When I asked if I was supposed to be the one taking the test, the nurse just smiled and said yes, then I watched her NOT change the label and just set it down in the back office of the reception area.

After filing a formal complaint about Dr. Singh and his outrageous behavior, I received a letter in the mail from RVBH informing me that if I had wanted a different doctor, I could have requested one. How was I supposed to know he would be SO terrible to me on the last visit of my stay? I should have switched after he literally misreported my condition and had me taking antipsychotics which I have NEVER taken or needed. The staff gave them to me in the middle of the day which was incorrect (Dr. Singh was shocked at that and did say that was just a mistake!) yeah? I don't think you should be making mistakes when it comes to people's mental health.

As I stated, this is not a place to go for help. It is merely a holding pen where you have to ask for 8 ounce cups of water and watch degrading children's cartoons for hours on end.

You just have to smile and fake your way out of there; god forbid you actually tell them anything other than "I'm fine" or else they will keep you longer. Every day I told them I was not suicidal and that I had future plans, was excited to be back on medication, etc. And they put me on a 14 day hold REGARDLESS. I found out at the end of my stay that my chart was regularly updated as having me being "extremely suicidal" and "seeing and hearing delusions?!?" This was one of the worse experiences of my life.

Wellwisher J.

My brother manraaj was a great help.Uncle fready is realy nice person nd hardwork man.mr iron rod from all the way from Dominican republic was my personal DJ overthere andera was also great help.
Sometimes she acts weird but good