In April 2014, Dr. Marino and I visited Veritas Collaborative in Durham, NC, a 2 year old for profit eating disorder treatment program specializing in children and adolescents. Don’t let the age of this program fool you – they clearly know what they’re doing and have some clinical and business heavy-weights in their corner.
Below is a write-up of our experiences, thoughts and additional info we gathered together just for you. As always, our perspective as clinicians may be uniquely different from those of perspective clients or their parents. We highly encourage you to do your own research before committing to any program.
What They Do
Veritas provides Inpatient, Residential Treatment and Partial Hospitalization for adolescents and children with eating disorders. What is key in our description is what is not listed. This means, during a time when other programs do everything for anyone, Veritas has committed to specializing. They have 26 inpatient/acute residential beds and 12 partial hospitalization beds. Below is a description of the three different levels of care (directly from the Veritas Collaborative site).
Inpatient hospitalization is the most intensive level of treatment available. Inpatient treatment is necessary for those who need frequent nursing care or are medically unstable (as determined by vital signs, lab abnormalities, or general physical and psychological condition). Patients who are severely entrenched in their disorders are depressed, suicidal, or are a danger to themselves or others, are also appropriate for this level of care. These patients see a medical doctor daily.
Acute Residential Treatment is a 24-hour monitored, structured treatment program for medically stable patients who still need constant supervision. Nursing care is still provided around the clock, but patients see doctors less frequently. Some individuals are admitted directly to residential treatment while others first go through inpatient treatment and them move to the residential program.
The Partial Hospitalization level of care is appropriate for patients who need structured programming but do not need 24-hour supervision. Patients participate in individual and group therapy, structured activities, and programming around meals similar to what is offered in the inpatient and residential programs. Some patients admit directly to this level of care, but many “step down” from the residential or inpatient levels, as partial programming still provides a high amount of structure and support. These patients are medically stable, and can move more readily while maintaining appropriate, non-disordered behaviors without direct supervision.
Another key feature to the Veritas program is the pervasive use of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), both of which are evidence-based treatments for eating disorders and co-occurring mental health issues.
Who They Serve
Veritas serves children and adolescents (both male/female) 10-19 years old from around the country experiencing eating disorders. It’s rare for an eating disorder program to serve younger adolescents and children which is a huge plus. It’s also less common for a program to work with male clients. 
Location
Veritas is located at 615 Douglas St #500, Durham, NC 27705. They sit right next to Duke University. They are 20 minutes from the Raleigh-Durham International Airport (super, super easy airport to travel through) and 2 hours from the Charlotte airport. The parking deck is easily accessed from the road. The building is nondescript but that’s works nicely for those seeking a more discrete treatment experience.
Fees + Insurance + Financing
Yes, they accept insurance and will work with you to figure out what is covered.
As with most treatment centers, there are many outside financing agencies that specifically work with mental, behavioral and substance abuse programs.
A quick word about their fees – they wouldn’t say. Not a peep about daily or monthly rates which, in our humble opinion is no bueno. See below in the Reviews section for commentary on this. It’s not unusual for programs to defer questions about cost but they eventually give us an idea (normally as a monthly rate). But not Veritas.
Reviews
It’s really disappointing and feels a bit awkward when we have a hard time finding negative reviews of a program. Either they’ve done a good job of scrubbing the internet of nasty feedback or…. they actually provide great service. From all around the intertubes we scoured parent blogs, professional review sites as well as the more general review sites. So what’s out there? What’s the overall judgement of this fledgling treatment center? Mostly just really nice praise for the staff, treatment and program as a whole. The thing that kept on coming up over and over was Veritas’s involvement of the whole family – which happens to be another key feature they told us about on our tour. Family work is at the core of how they impact the client’s treatment.
One negative in our view is discussion of cost. We really, really like programs to be up front about what the estimated costs for service will be. It’s not that we expect a solid dollar amount since we know as well as the next professional that expenses can go up or down depending on loads of variables. But what we do want to see is an effort towards transparency, especially with pricing. When asked for pricing we were told ‘it depends‘ but would not commit to a daily or monthly rate and nothing is listed on their site.
Other than the cost issue we experienced, there’s not much else for us to complain about. We’ll definitely continue looking for bad reviews and update this post.
Contact Information
Reach out to Kelly Robinson at krobinson@veritascollaborative.com or 919.698.8574 to learn more or take a tour. You can also schedule a tour directly from their site here: Schedule a Tour.
Final Thoughts
Overall, we encourage perspective clients to take a tour and consider the program. It’s best to higher an educational consultant or case manager to go with you. They will ask detailed questions you may not think to ask or just feel way too uncomfortable to ask. This is a decision you should not make alone.