Peer-led Mental Health Crisis Services Play a Critical Role in Their Effectiveness
Key Findings:
Peer-led Approaches Enhance Crisis Services
The report highlights instances where peer-led approaches have significantly improved the outcomes of mental health crisis interventions. Peer support is shown to foster a sense of understanding, empathy, and connection that traditional services may lack.
Personal Narratives Drive Change
Featuring real-life stories and experiences, the report illustrates how personal narratives can be powerful tools for advocacy and change. By amplifying the voices of those with lived experience, the Bazelon Center aims to destigmatize mental health challenges and promote a more compassionate approach to crisis intervention.
Recommendations for Policymakers
The report includes a set of recommendations for policymakers, urging them to integrate peer-led models into existing mental health crisis services. By doing so, policymakers can create a more comprehensive and person-centered approach to addressing mental health crises.
The report describes many promising programs providing supports that individuals with mental health challenges want and need, including those led by people with lived experience and those in which they are significantly involved, including PRN’s respite, Retreat @ The Plaza.
PRN’s founder and Chief Executive Officer, Cherene Caraco shared, “With the continued rise in suicide, overdose, and the use of the most restrictive, costly, and harmful responses to people experiencing emotional distress, the demand for non-carceral, non-pathology-based, and effective healing alternatives continues to emerge from local communities, states, and at the federal level.
As PRN advocates for a fundamental shift in the way mental health challenges, trauma, and people experiencing them are understood and treated, one of the primary questions we receive is “what are the alternatives to hospitalizing people?” This report offers comprehensive national models and emerging practices that are currently operating and proven effective throughout the US.
We are grateful to The Bazelon Center for uplifting peer-run alternatives and PRNs efforts to advance healing and recovery through the wisdom of shared lived and living experience.”
Read the full report (PDF):
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