In the San Jose Spotlight article, “Santa Clara County launches mental health crisis hotline,” Clinical Director Karen Meagher discusses the importance of the continuum of care following a mental health crisis call with the mobile crisis team.
On Saturday, July 16, the new mental health crisis hotline launched, 988 replacing 911 and the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. When individuals call 988, they will be routed to trained mental health crisis counselors who can deescalate the situation, provide the caller with resources for support and deploy mobile crisis units as needed. Meagher said, “As much as I believe in mobile units and how important they are, what’s really going to support decreasing recidivism are those follow up services.” She adds, “Can we get the people connected to the support and services needed long-term? Some of our teams can do follow ups for 30 days and offer that support.”
