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The Way Out : Lost Patients After 10 months at Washington State's largest psychiatric hospital, Adam Aurand is discharged onto the streets of downtown Seattle — ejected into a world shaped by decades of deinstitutionalization and failure to build community-based mental health care. His mother rushes to save him before he gets pulled back into the "churn." A Seattle Times reporter tries to pinpoint where the discharge process failed — and the investigation leads her to new conclusions about the limitations of psychiatric care in the U.S.

Lost Patients

The Way Out

season 1, episode 5

The Way Out

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After 10 months at Washington State's largest psychiatric hospital, Adam Aurand is discharged onto the streets of downtown Seattle — ejected into a world shaped by decades of deinstitutionalization and failure to build community-based mental health care. His mother rushes to save him before he gets pulled back into the "churn." A Seattle Times reporter tries to pinpoint where the discharge process failed — and the investigation leads her to new conclusions about the limitations of psychiatric care in the U.S.

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Heidi Aurand mourns the memory of her late son Adam in her Portland home on June 27, 2023. Daniel Kim/The Seattle Times hide caption

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Daniel Kim/The Seattle Times

Heidi Aurand mourns the memory of her late son Adam in her Portland home on June 27, 2023.

Daniel Kim/The Seattle Times