TIFTON — People who have mental health issues or chemical dependency disorders and use the services of Greenleaf satellite clinics in Tifton, Albany and Douglas will have to find other providers when the doors of those outpatient centers close on Dec. 19.

South Georgia Medical Center in Valdosta owns Greenleaf and its outpatient centers. The outpatient center in Valdosta will remain open.

The Hospital Authority of Valdosta and Lowndes County announced this week that the closing of the out-of-town satellite facilities was due to several years of “declining reimbursements from payors of behavioral health services, including Medicare and Medicaid.”

“The closing is reflective of our tough economic times,” stated SGMC CEO James McGahee in a press release. “It is in no way a reflection on the performance of the staff or our affiliated physicians.”

Alex Patterson, Greenleaf’s administrator, said Monday in a telephone interview that he and other staff members are working on placing clients who need continued treatment with other services available in the area. He said new clients can still schedule services with the Greenleaf satellite centers, but if those clients are diagnosed as needing treatment or services longer than Dec. 19, Greenleaf will go ahead and refer them to other agencies.

SGMC is a not-for-profit hospital and doesn’t receive state funding, Patterson said. Other agencies that do have seen their funding decrease with state budget cuts and cuts to Medicaid and Medicare coverage.

“Behavior health services has not gotten great funding over the years and it’s gotten to the point that the escalating cost of health care and the decreasing revenue stream is making it difficult,” Patterson said. “If the reimbursements were better for this type of service, I think you would see more agencies providing it.

“It’s bad for me because I like the people who work in our division offices and I wish there was a way to make it work. I hope better times are ahead of us with all of this.”

According to Laura Love, SGMC Community Relations Director, the equivalent of 11 full-time employees currently work in the Tifton office. Love said the clinic in Tifton was in existence when SGMC purchased Greenleaf in 1999. Love said the agency tracks the number of visits — which can be multiple monthly visits per client — and not the number of individual clients who use the Tifton facility. She said there were 5,981 visits at Greenleaf’s Tifton Outpatient Center in Tifton from Oct. 1, 2007 until Sept. 30 of this year.

The office is located at 114 W. 12th St.

Love said Wednesday that letters will be mailed to Greenleaf clients explaining the closures and listing other sources of behavioral health services available in the region.

“When patients come in for visits over the next two months, the Greenleaf center staff will ask patients if they have found another provider and if not, the staff will assist current patients with calls to other providers,” Love said. “Our goal is to make this transition for patients as smooth as possible.”

Love said the list will contain the names of psychiatrists in Douglas, Albany, Moultrie and Valdosta as well as information about Turning Point Hospital in Moultrie, Greenleaf in Valdosta and some of the other behavioral health facilities in and around Albany.