ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Kirkbride Plan

Okay kiddo, let me explain the Kirkbride Plan to you in really simple terms.

A long time ago, people were starting to build big hospitals for people who had mental illnesses. One guy named Thomas Kirkbride came up with a special design for these hospitals called the Kirkbride Plan.

Basically, the Kirkbride Plan was a blueprint for making these hospitals really big and organized. They had long hallways with rooms on either side so that doctors and nurses could easily take care of the patients.

Some people thought it was important for the hospitals to have nice gardens and courtyards so that the patients could get fresh air and enjoy the outdoors. And so, some of the hospitals built really big gardens and even farms where patients could help with the gardening or farming if they wanted to.

At the time, the Kirkbride Plan was considered to be a really good way of taking care of people with mental illnesses. It helped doctors and nurses to keep an eye on their patients and to make sure that they were getting the best care possible.

And that's pretty much it, kiddo - the Kirkbride Plan was a way of designing and building big hospitals for people with mental illnesses so that they could get the care they needed in a safe and organized environment.