San Diego County’s Mobile Crisis Response Teams are expanding service to more college campuses and planning improved operations in East County with the coming of the region’s first stand-alone crisis stabilization unit.
Officials released data on Monday showing the countywide effort has rapidly grown since its launch as a pilot program in early 2021, a sign that it is working as intended, they said. The San Diego Union-Tribune reported on the status of the crisis teams, or MCRTs, in April.
“The numbers behind this service make clear that it works, that it is significant at the population health level in the county of San Diego,” Luke Bergmann, the county’s director of Behavioral Health Services, said at a news conference held by county Supervisor Terra Lawson-Remer about the MCRTs.
Crisis teams were designed to replace law enforcement officials with mental health experts for people in any kind of non-violent mental health distress. Each team has a case manager, mental health clinician and a peer support specialist. They operate all over the county at all hours of the day. To access them for oneself or anyone in need, the phone line is 988.
The first MCRTs went to work in January 2021 as part of a $10 million pilot program in North County. They soon expanded to South County and were available countywide by December of that year with about 16 teams. Today, there are 44 teams, Bergmann said.
While staffing shortages have impacted some areas of the county’s behavioral health system, expansion of the MCRT program has not been hampered. One factor is that the public health department relies on two outside entities, Exodus and Telecare, to provide the services, officials said.
Since its inception, teams have responded to more than 13,000 calls and helped more than 7,800 people, according to the county.
Of those individuals served:
12 percent were 18 years and younger;16 percent were 60 years and older;72 percent were living independently;And 18 percent were homeless.
Nearly 100 percent of calls have been diverted from law enforcement and more than half of all calls are resolved in the field without the need for transportation to emergency rooms and hospitals, according to the county.
Officials hope to prevent hospital visits further and improve help for people in East County with a forthcoming crisis center in El Cajon. The 16-recliner facility will be the county’s seventh such location. Others are in Chula Vista, Escondido, Hillcrest, Oceanside, Vista and at the San Diego County Psychiatric Hospital.
“East County is our second-highest call volume,” said Breawna Lane, the program administrator for Telecare Corp. “So, it’s going to help a lot because we won’t have to go across regions to get people to care, which will then decrease our call times and we’ll be able to take more calls, essentially. It will also make it easier for the member to get back home since (the crisis center) will be closer to where they live.”
Additionally, officials said about 28 percent of calls required transportation to a crisis stabilization unit. About 12 percent required transportation to emergency rooms or hospitals.
Through partnerships with the county, crisis teams are expected to soon respond to calls from the University of San Diego, California State University San Marcos and Cuyamaca College. MCRTs have already been responding to incidents at San Diego State University, Point Loma Nazarene University and Mira Mesa College. More than 20 calls for crises such as suicidal ideation have been placed from the colleges between July 2023 and January, according to county data.
Efforts to deploy the service in schools of all grade levels are underway, though officials said a rollout date is still unknown.
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