Asylums - Management

The management of public institutions is usually entrusted to specific governing bodies or officers. The appropriate body can hire employees to operate the asylum but cannot relinquish its management responsibilities. Physicians who wish to visit patients in private nursing homes can be excluded. If an institution does not provide reasons at the time of the exclusion, it does not preclude the institution from excluding the physician, provided that valid reasons exist and are communicated upon request.

Generally, the governing body of an asylum has the power to decide how funds appropriated for its support shall be spent, in the absence of contrary legislative provision. Funds appropriated by a legislature for specific purposes cannot, however, be diverted, and the governing body of the asylum does not have the power to compel the state to provide funding for services other than those for which the money was appropriated. Similarly, they are not empowered to borrow money or incur debts beyond allotments made for the support of institutions.

It is proper procedure to make a provision that an asylum may only accept as many inmates for admission as the facilities can adequately accommodate.

An institution may not initiate a visitation plan that limits a patient's right to allocate his or her visiting time among particular people, unless such limitation bears a rational relationship to the patient's treatment or security.