I absolutely love Lake! The amount of time, care, and effort the staff puts towards each of their patients and people in need Is something I haven't seen in many other mental health facilities at all. You don't just feel like another project or number with them. They truly care and want to help everyone in any way they can. I cannot recommend them enough for mental health care! read more

Weird place to be, the food is cold the staff are rude, they will lose your property and blame it on it being left somewhere else when you knew you brung your stuff read more

Terrible hospita! The Communication is almost nonexistent. Especially on the weekends! They should have someone covering a patient 7 days a week! The after care is just as bad! My partner was having hallucinations from a new prescription and I couldn't get ahold off his psychiatrist or anyone for that matter. I left 3 messages with Emily, her receptionist and never got a return call!!! Therefore, had to go to er. DEFINITELY A ONE STAR!!! read more

My son was the be "assessed" yesterday. Because he wasn't getting his way and was told by police not to tell him where we're going. When his figured it out, he lost it. We get there, in the waiting room, he runs away. NO ONE! Not one worker came out. I had to call police, they find him, he tells them made up stuff and they give into and put shit in my kids head. So we go to in take, and this tall, bald light skin dude accuses me being on "that h". Assuming that's heroin, of course i get immediately offended as my son has this smell on his face. So i asked for a different "assessor" and she asked two questions and left. They then determined he didn meet the requirements. But they refused to let us leave, leaving us in the locked hall for several hours. They were rude, disrespectful, unprofessional, and their behavior just disgusted me. Then one of the "workers" thought itd be fun to out her hands on me as I'm walking out and police saw. they did nothing. My son then starts attacking me. They told me to "comtrol my child" verbatim! Place disgusted me! DONT EVER Go HERE!! They are NOT there fir your well being. They are there for the money! Sick people out there, please be careful! read more

IF YOU LOVE YOUR FAMILY MEMBER DO NOT SEND THEM HERE. THEY DO NOT COUNT SAT & SUN AS RELEASE DATES. THEY JUST WANT TO ABUSE INSURANCE & IT NEEDS TO STOP. I am writing this oh behalf of my brother he stayed from 11/22/2025 to 12/2/2025. Upon arrival they made him get fully naked. They made him squat & cough as if he was in jail. He was there for suicidal ideation & not to be treated like a prisoner. He was given breakfast cold eggs & what seemed to be bacon. From what he said it was more like dog food. He was taken to a room where a black lady with a heavy accent kept asking him questions & he had to keep asking her to repeat the question as he was not understanding her due to her accent. She have him a pad that was attached to her lap top & said sign 20 times without letting know what he was signing. When he questioned what was going on she responded that he would get all the paperwork that he had signed once it was done. My brother was checked into the geriatric wing, even though he is not geriatric. There was a woman that works there by the name of Patricia. They called her Pat. She was more concerned about talking about her hair dye than patient care. She made fun of a person that had dementia. The lady said I think I saw my son and Pat said well Tweety thought he thought a putty cat and he didn't. There were patients there that were walking around with soiled gowns people that wouldn't take showers & had bad body order. His room was right next to the common area so there was no way of getting sleep. Two days he was moved into a same sex unit with over 25 people. There is a board with what the daily schedule is. It clearly states that vitals are taken at 6:30 in the morning yet they were woken up at 6 AM daily. Half of the staff is completely rude. There is a black lady that has a tattoo that said fuck it on her arm. If she was in a bad mood, then everybody would suffer the consequences. She was rude and disrespectful when she was in a bad mood. The bedrooms are constantly locked so the patients can't go lay down when they want to. They have to track down the techs to get the room doors open. If you are able to sleep, you are woken up to go participate in group sessions. Some of these groups have nothing to do with suicidal ideation. There was coloring activities. There was chair yoga there was bowling. There was bean bag tossing. They were taken down to the cafeteria three times a day. The food was disgusting according to my brother it was more like dog food it was cold, and it was the worst food that he has ever had. My brother says the only good thing about this place were the patients. Not using last names. I think it's OK to send a shout out to the people that made it bearable for my brother to be there. Thank you Cameron, Kyler, Chad, Alton, Max (who is from Waukegan) Qwade ( sorry for the grown man that made you cry & for the staff not doing a damn thing. Connell (He still has the scary the stress ball you made) Jesus, Aiden and others he has a hard time remembering other names. If you read this, reply to him and message him. You guys are what made the eight day stay bearable. He hopes that you are all well and he wished you would have traded info to keep in touch even though you are from different states. Please I beg you to look into these complaints. People are there for suicidal ideations and other mental issues and should be treated different. It is sad that my brother rather commit suicide than to ever be in your facility. That is not acceptable. The food is the worse thing my brother says he would not feed it to the dogs. Sometimes the eggs were served frozen. It is sad that the other patients provided mental relief to my brother and not your staff. The people that gave meds were great and nothing needs to change with them but 1/2 of your techs need to be retrained or fired. Northwestern Medicine Behavioral Health Services Woodstock is 100% better in all aspects and you should follow their practices. THE 5 STAR REVIEWS LEFT ON HERE ARE FAKE. read more

A friend landed here. The place looks like a hospital from outside but once you go inside the aire changes to a very jail like atmosphere. Worse yet visits are once a week for one hour. Telephone calls are only twice a day for 15 minutes and the quality of care and type of care is basically non existent. Yes. Let's have someone get sent home on their same medicines that aren't working and have them go back to more of the same situational depression. That's totally what mental healthcare is supposed to do. Go anywhere but this place and Jackson Park. These two hospitals are prisons in disguise. read more

Holding my daughter longer than 72 hours and being very evasive about letting her go! They say one thing then tell them to sign a contract and and don't let them know that weekends and holidays don't count! read more

It was actually good and the food is decent. The neighborhood is wild, but the workers are fierce and lots of people get good help here, especially from the cities which it's located between Chicago and Milwaukee. read more

I was admitted here in 2022. I was coerced into signing papers that were poorly explained and made to feel as though I committed a crime. In reality I was going through a hard time and suffering from severe depression and this purgatorial nightmare made my suffering far worse than it needed to be. I was roomed with another patient who was apparently admitted for a violent episode and who talked in his sleep. I barely slept and my health declined further. When I tell you getting out of there was the most liberating feeling I cannot speak that enough. I kissed the ground outside and went to have brunch with my family. All of this to say these people are nasty and do nothing but keep you long enough to make your insurance pay as much as possible. I was left with a massive bill afterwards and truth be told these people will never receive a dime for how unprofessional it was and how degrading and patronizing the staff were during that time. Gave me nightmares for weeks and I pray that conditions in places like these improve. It's a shame that our healthcare rewards such fraudulent medical practice. Not to mention trying to coerce me into getting a vaccination with no explanation as to why I'd need it. Truly reprehensible and a 0/10 would not recommend. read more

This hospital lost my belongings twice during separate inpatient stays. Staff promised to look into it and call me back, but never did. No accountability, no follow-up, and no resolution. Very disappointing and unprofessional.‍ read more

Terrible experience for our daughter from the admission( extremely long, rude, uncaring....) to the very last minute of her " stay"... Giving one star because the therapist was nice as well as one evening nurse read more

Was here for almost a month. I would rather follow through with my negative thoughts than come back to a place like this. The majority of the staff are lazy and don't care about you or taking care of the patients. Was yelled at by staff for feeling uncomfortable around a specific individual, kept in dirty rooms, and fed food portions that they feed in elementary school. That's not even all of the problems with this place. If you're seeking treatment, please go anywhere but Lake Behavioral. read more

Our son spent a week there and the entire staff was very kind and communicated with us on a regular basis. Specifically, their program director Carie was very supportive and helped to ease our anxiety. She continues to follow up with my husband and myself along with checking in with our son weeks after he was discharged. She cares deeply about the work she does and has been a real blessing to us. God brought Carie to us and helped us to get through this very difficult time in our lives. Thank you for all you've done to help repair our broken hearts. read more

if you're wanting to see care, I would never recommend a place like this while I was a patient there I was assaulted inside and nothing was done about it besides, switching me to a new unit I also found out later on in the new unit they switched me to that one of the text was assaulted just like me they say they do one-on-one care which I didn't see any of that. It wasn't one-on-one care. It was where everybody was in one room together we had at least 12 people in one unit or the other unit which I was in before they transfer me to the new one had about 20 people and you had. A social worker come in and talk to you and do activities with you and do groups with you. It was something that was very horrible and traumatic to me and I wouldn't recommend anybody wanting to see care in a facility like this cause I feel like they don't do anything to help you and most of all the texts are the ones that are also running the groups asking how you're doing every day on a scale of one to 10 and what does that have to do with giving you care. if looking for care for a loved one, please don't take them here. They say your insurance covers it, but it doesn't. They're just looking to line their pockets and they don't care about the people who are inside seeking help. I wouldn't recommend eating their food either because nothing was edible while I was in this facility I've lost. Wait while I was in this facility because the food wasn't edible enough to eat on a daily basis you basically were being starved. Everything was very bland no seasoning or taste, but you still had to eat it because that was the only thing they would give you so please think twice about this facility before you go and put your loved ones in here I just got out today and I'm a former patient and I will never recommend this ever again read more

Avoid at all costs. Doctor discontinued my daughters medication she has been on for 2 years, we have to start from scratch when she's discharged with our outpatient provider. Doctor wouldn't return my calls. Nurses are bottom of the barrel, no one speaks English and can't give you basic info on diagnosis or meds. Robots. Psychiatric hospitals are the only setting where you are admitted, taken off meds, not cared for and kept as long as your insurance will allow even if they aren't doing anything for you. It's fraud. read more

The most complicated place ever. I've been calling to get my belongings and I just keep getting transferred from line to line. They kept my expensive prescribed medications and I need them for my ADHD read more

Honestly if you have good insurance they will most definitely will keep you longer than you want to or try to convince you that you're not ready to go even if you show signs of improvement I also ask to change me to a different unit multiple times a day and they didn't do anything nor did I heard nothing back also the nurses are super super ghetto nothing but gossip I mean I at least found like 3 nice ones but let me tell you they need to hire better ones. Also they will ignore you if you need medical attention I witnessed it myself I felt so bad for people that needed medical help I honestly don't recommend this hospital I've been to better one mental hospital before however I did meet like 3 technician that weren't horrible read more

This is a place that is not at all accommodating to LGBTQ+ patients and doesn't seem like they even make the effort. My good friend, we'll call him Michael, is there now due to depression. He has been calling me from the hospital every day with updates and I'm more and more upset with each new incident. First off, this place is completely inefficient. They are absolutely insisting on keeping Michael there for a full week even though he is in a show starting on Thursday. He told his doctor and social worker way ahead of time that he has a very important commitment and BEGGED to be let out early every day. There was no communication between the doctor and the social worker, and ultimately they refused to let Michael out to do his show. So the show is going ahead without him. He is devastated. The far worse offense though is the transphobia. Michael is a trans man, fully transitioned, everything legally changed. However, his insurance isn't updated with his new name. So everything has him listed as Michelle, and no matter how many times he explains the situation to staff, no one will call him Michael. Every time I call the hospital and ask about him they act confused. "You mean Michelle? I'll get her." How hard is it to hear that someone is trans and write a note next to someone's name? Apparently pretty hard. Michael told me about an incident where the nurses were talking amongst themselves close enough so he could hear about how they don't understand "trans" and think people should just "stay the gender they're born as", laughing about it. These are the people working at a mental health facility? How could that attitude possibly be expected to help a person in a fragile state? Michael tried to complain to his doctor about one staff member in particular who kept calling him "Michelle" and acted annoyed when corrected, and the next day that staff member approached Michael and said "I know what you said about me to your doctor." What! Scary and unprofessional, and also a complete violation. Michael told the social worker about these incidents, in tears, to which they responded "well that's just something you're going to have to deal with." This facility breaks my heart. They make absolutely no effort to accommodate trans people. You don't have to understand everything about being transgender to at least try to show basic respect. Michael says the whole experience has been abysmal. I just don't understand how these staff members can help patients when they treat them like this. They are supposed to help, not harm. Please, Lake Behavioral, take a good look at some of your practices and please try to improve. read more

Our son needed to be hospitalized and it was determined that a residential program was necessary. The social worker met with us, as his parents, for :30 for the first week. She didn't have a comprehensive picture of what was going on. So much so that our son's therapist had to insert herself. The staff didn't reach out to his psychiatrist at all or his therapist until he had been in the hospital for 2 weeks. It was extremely troubling. Our insurance company contacted the hospital to receive approval from the facility and nobody contacted them and it forced it into an appeal. They had plenty of time to respond. The billing department was contacting me while the staff was not responding to the insurance company. UNACCEPTABLE. read more

FIND ANOTHER PLACE. A friend was at this facility for 2 weeks and while an appointment was setup, the patient still had to wait 6 hours to be seen. You treatment is public you were roomed with other patients. In the end this facility l list the patient's personal effects, a cellphone. I'm not saying the staff member stole it but they probably did. This place has the atmosphere of an animal shelter. read more

I spent over a month here due to mental health problems and the staff was great. I didn't see much of the doctors but the staff cared for me and the food was actually really good. read more

I have so much to say, where do I begin. The rooms stink of urine, the day room also smells of body Oder, the beds are as hard as rocks. The nurses, Kristine being one of them and Techs ignore the patients and are rude. You practically have to beg the nurses to contact your doctor, if you do get a response it could be hours. The HIPAA violations are unbelievable. HIPAA is the form you sigh when you are admitted, it's to protect your privacy as a patient of the facility. Please to not let your friends or family to be admitted into this place that is so depressing. I'll name one Of the staff, the Tech named Antonia, she should not be employed by a facility that is meant to help patients get through one of the hardest times of theirs life. She is loud, rude, uncaring. She acts like a drill Sargent. She made me and the other patients extremely emotional. I found out by another patient that a year before becoming a Tech she was a housekeeper for this facility. I believe she should have had training on treating patients like people not her own little soldiers. Avoid this facility at all costs. Their are some great techs, Dorsey, Tom, Julian, and nurses Jackie and Esbeth (I hope I spelled her name correctly). They helped me get through the days , they are caring people and facilities like this one need more people like them. read more

Gaslighting is practiced regularly here. They treated me like a criminal (I am not). My social worker spent literally 10 minutes with me during my two week stay. He lied about everything - even to my husband - and lacked the empathy required for his job title. One of the nurses actually laughed at me in my drugged state (they drugged me and never told me what their cocktail was going to do to me) and made me ricochet off the walls back to my room without assistance. I was nothing more than insurance money to them. When my benefit ran out, they finally released me. Their "help" consisted of six group meetings daily and toxic positivity ran rampant. They did nothing for me but suck up my benefits and treat me like dirt. They were truly scary. If you have a choice, go somewhere else. read more

So i went to this hospital a while back, and while some of the techs were nice and some were awful, i actually had an okay time there. from some of the horror stories ive read here, my experience was toned down a lot. the floors are REAL dusty tho read more

My daughter was brought to this hospital for her mental health and now I feel like I need to go to a mental health hospital. Normally patients stay for three days until they are stable and leave with an outpatient plan for treatment. Her release date kept being pushed back and no one gave her a reason why. When I called, they claimed she hadn't signed a release when we had just talked to each other and she said she was going to sign one. I was pushed off to the next nurse who of course never called. My family is separated further on Christmas Eve thanks to this hospital. We have good insurance which makes me think they are milking it for money. If you can go somewhere else, do it. read more

I tested negative for coronavirus prior to admission to the lake behavioral hospital, 70 year old woman by the name of Rita also tested negative for coronavirus prior to admission. We were both admitted on the same date and time and we both contracted coronavirus on the same unit, on the same date and time. to punish us for their hospital infecting us with the coronavirus they placed us both in solitary confinement 24 hours a day 7 days a week and held us 6 days past our original discharge dates just because they told us that the federal government pays them twice as much to keep a COVID 19 patient there than any of the other patients. I was in fear for my life because because the staff violated my HIPPA rights by telling all of the patients on the unit that I had coronavirus and that I was a danger to their health and their lives. At one point the unit staff encouraged several patients to yell out fight, fight, Nigger and a white. I am 58 years old and I did not ask for this. When the staff realized that they could not get all of the patients to commit a battery against me, 10 staff members came into my room while I was in the bathroom having a bowel movement and committed an assault and battery against me and stabbed me twice in my right shoulder. read more

My last reviews and opinion was based on my experience on The year 2019 they now have a brand new hospital with better system but you will never see me there again I'm suffering from PTSD Those pictures are old from the old hospital Im sure the new hospital must be much better in regards of my experience I can't recuperate from it I think I never will . Im trying to delete the old reviews but I cant I dont know how . The staff was mean very very mean and cruel but the Philippine girls were Amazing very gentle, I have thousands of bad things to say and a handful good ones but. But for legal reasons I just can't but if the hospital director wish to contact me he or she can do so by answering to my reviews. And just tell me that the circumstances of the old hospital wasn't as bad as im describing he or she can call me lier But I have the pictures to prove it . The food was horrible Maybe now is is hotel quality ‍ One guy the was very decent Juan . I want an appointment with the hospital director and tell him I wish his daughter or son were in the same unit as mine maybe that way she or he can tell them how horrible that place was.( Old hospital) Dr Okole or what ever is name was told me that if I tell him one more time that I was doing ok I was there to stay for a least 3 month or more and I only told him I m ok 2 times a Doctor with no care for others he only care about keeping you long enough for the $$$ Im so traumatized that I need pill for PTSD AFTER COMING OUT OF THAT HOSPITAL!! read more

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Personal in Intake are very unprofessional and rude. They don't understand anything about mental health. I don't understand why they work there. Never again will take my son there. read more

Shame on this business. That's right.. this is a business, not a hospital. Gaslighting and script reading is about the most treatment you will get here. Not one person there knows what they're doing. They will force a panic attack on you through bogus medication and lie to your face about why you can't have MEDICATION YOUVE BEEN PRESCRIBED FOR MOMTHS WITH NO ISSUES. Only to tell you what they think about your response. First off, no one knows, (you) better than you. Zero accountability for lost belongings. They lost my memorial bracelet, with my roommates name on it, one of the only ways I can still remember him after he took his life in 2014. Shame on you all! read more

My husband was hospitalized for 14 days. There is no visiting due to covid, which I find terrible because family members need that connection. He spoke to a psychiatrist who was in the dark on a zoom call. Very impersonal. I would not recommend this place. read more

Our daughter was admitted on 5/24 and discharged 6/1. No handbook was given to me on intake, even though I sat for almost an hour and a half signing countless forms. Had a lot of questions, as a result. Finally received a handbook, which would have answered some--but not all. Very vague information. You never get to see the adolescent floor where the kids stay, so you have no idea of how clean this place is, how well maintained it is, etc, and you never meet most of the team that sees your child. You are leaving your kid here for at least 7 DAYS to get help, and this was VERY unnerving, especially after reading the other reviews and not having a choice of WHERE she was admitted. It all had to do with which facility in the area had a bed. We had waited 12 HOURS, yes 12 HOURS in the Froedert South ER waiting to hear what facility had a bed and could take her. Handbook says they have time allocated for "school", but our daughter had use of her Chromebook only ONCE during her time there. Other times they may have been designated as "school" was through worksheets printed off the internet. Staff communication and business practices are in need of a LOT of improvement. Older woman at front desk needs better customer service skills. She was short/disrespectful to me when I dropped off items for our daughter, when a LOT more understanding and just plain friendliness is needed for us PARENTS going through this horrible situation with our teen! I was told Front desk staff is NOT responsible for inventory of items--that security was. So the handoff of items---even when CLEARLY MARKED with our daughter's name did not have a reliable process of making sure they were secure, would get to our daughter, and would not get lost. Items that were lost for 5 DAYS included our daughter's Invisaligns and glasses, as well as paperwork I needed to get to her care team ASAP. I was on the phone EVERY DAY trying to get them to find these important, expensive items she needed to be wearing! UNACCEPTABLE. Nursing staff was supposed to call us EVERY DAY with an update as to how our daughter was doing. That happened only ONCE. Otherwise, interactions/phone calls to them with questions was largely pleasant, especially when it came to understanding my disgust about them not being able to find the stuff they had lost. At one point, her therapist/social worker said she noticed our daughter was "very off today", not participating in group therapy, etc., but then backtracked and said she was participating and doing fine. One time, when I called the nurse about something, she literally HOLLERED for my daughter who was down the hall, to ask her something. NOT PROFESSIONAL AT ALL. Therapist did not respond to my texts or voicemails on a timely basis. When discharge papers were given to me, there was no thorough explanation or discussion about the diagnoses on the paperwork. Only had ONE "family therapy" session, which never got to the heart of serious questions as to the WHY/WHY'S our daughter ended up there. I didn't expect miracles with regards to our daughter's care there, but there is a WHOLE LOT of improvement needed with these mental health facilities. It is a tragedy to both patients and parents alike that these facilities can charge such an insane amount of money and operate like they do. Speaking of money, on discharge, the billing person came in to show me the bill. Basically only said what our portion was, which after insurance, was still almost $2,500! No itemized list of what, specifically, those charges were for. So, I didn't pay it at that time, but they would have liked me to, of course. Later, I got an email that was supposed to have an itemized list, and all it had was a flat amount for each day she was there. Not any more helpful than getting the total due at discharge. I will give them credit for allowing a payment plan and giving a discount if we paid the bill in full, but our experience overall was unreal. read more

Picking up a friend from Mn who has been here for a week and all I can say is there are RUDE, UNHELPFUL and UNFRIENDLY place I have EVER ENCOUNTERED!!! and that's just picking someone up!! Makes me wonder how they ACTUALLY treat there patients.. read more

this place they have some nice staff like tony, ms. Monique, visa and Paris those are really the only nice people in there and other then that all the other staff are assholes and don't treat people right and don't get me started on there food we had tacos and the meat was pink on the inside and it looked like dirt i felt like i got helped by the people in there then i did by the staff and the doctors they only want the money and how i'm that is because the doctors are alway on there phone even when your talking to them and the doctors said they where going to up the dosage on my meds well i was in there and they didn't change them and they said the only reason i was there for 10 days was just because they changed my med but they never changed my med so they are just trying to get money out of people don't go here or send your kids here. read more

I was admitted to this hospital and it was the worse i've been to. I was in a wing with girls ages 12-17 and someone was sexually assaulted on our unit, when tech and staff found out they gaslighted us trying to make us all think it's a rumor and didn't happen. Staff were extremely rough, no leniency, they cut the calls short (if you were in the bathroom when it was your turn you didn't get to make a call), they would read through private thoughts in notebooks and ransack the rooms. Body searches when things off unit go missing, pens, pencils, utensils, etc. And my biggest pet peeve, they would never give you the right meds, wrong prescription or wrong dosage. Or worse they would tell you that your not authorized to take those meds even though you took them during previous days. And the scheduling was all over the place. My morning meds I would take at night, and my night meds I would take when I work up. I was constantly drowsy and felt like a zombie. read more

This hospital is the worst I gave ever seen and had to deal with. The doctors only see patients for less than 2 minutes and only want to prescribe medicine. Lake Behavioral Health is filthy dirty they should lose their license. read more

i went there at 14 years old and it was miserable there was blood on the wall in my rooms bathroom. my roommate told me they didn't wash my sheets before i got there. terrible food worse than school lunch! no soap just hand sanitizer. quiet time was miserable we sat in our rooms for 45 minutes doing nothing. i felt very unsafe there. do not recommend to send anyone there. read more

Very friendly staff now that it is under new management. Was going thru a hard time in life and they helped me get thru my difficult times in a easy way by understanding what mental illness is. read more