PORTLAND, Maine (AP) The Maine supreme court has ruled that psychiatric patients may not be held for extended periods in emergency rooms during an involuntary hospitalization without a judge being alerted.

The Maine Supreme Judicial Court ruled unanimously Thursday in the case of a patient who was held for a month against his will in the LincolnHealth Miles Campus Hospital emergency room in Damariscotta.

The court is enforcing a limit of five days, with a judge’s approval, and a judge must be notified within 24 hours.

The ruling came against a backdrop of an uptick in mental health worries during the pandemic and a shortage of psychiatric hospital beds in the state.