“Like a physical health crisis, a mental health crisis can be devastating for individuals, families and communities. Too often, that experience is met with delay, detainment and even denial of service that can all add to a person’s trauma history. While a crisis cannot be planned, we can plan how we organize services to meet the needs of those individuals who experience a mental health crisis. It can also lead to hope, recovery and action. It is the latter outcome this document seeks to promote.”
We are encouraged by the focus of the President’s June 16th Executive Order on shifting responsibility to address the needs of individuals with mental illnesses and substance use disorders, and those experiencing homelessness, away from law enforcement to appropriate social service providers. However, increasing the capacity of social workers and other mental health professionals to work alongside law enforcement to co-respond to address situations does not go far enough in reducing the role of law enforcement.
The National Guidelines for Crisis Care – A Best Practice Toolkit advances national guidelines in crisis care within a toolkit that supports program design, development, implementation and continuous quality improvement efforts. It is intended to help mental health authorities, agency administrators, service providers, state and local leaders think through and develop the structure of crisis systems that meet community needs.
This document was produced for the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
SAMHSA’s National Guidelines for Behavioral Health Crisis Care
Crisis Now saves time and operating costs by improving access to care.
The assessment and programmatic scoring guide.
Transforming services is within our reach
Link mobile crisis and crisis beds to the call center. Use air traffic control objectives:
Status Disposition for Intensive Referrals
The volume estimation and clinical distribution guide.
Crisis Now saves time and operating costs by improving access to care.
Good crisis care reduces and prevents suicides while providing more immediate and targeted help for the person in distress. In addition, it cuts cost of care substantially by reducing the need for psychiatric hospital bed usage, emergency department visits, and law enforcement overuse. In general, mental health crisis care in the U.S. is inconsistent and inadequate. Members of the Crisis Services Task Force of the National Action Alliance for Suicide Prevention (Action Alliance) created the Crisis Now concept and authored the Crisis Now paper; identifying the exceptional practices desired in a crisis services.
