Celebrating first year of Crisis Response Unit
It's a happy first birthday to our very successful Crisis Response Unit which has been supporting people across the county who are experiencing a mental health emergency, as well as helping reduce hospital admissions.
The aim of the Crisis Response Unit (CRU) is to respond to those in mental health crisis in the community within one hour, providing rapid, trauma-informed-care to patients.
The CRU can respond to referrals that come through the Integrated Response hub or through EMAS (East Midlands Ambulance Service). When a call comes into EMAS, they triage the enquiry and if there is no further requirement for a physical intervention but due to a patient’s mental health presentation, they do not feel safe to leave the patient, a referral is made to the CRU. This enables the patient to receive appropriate care and the EMAS crew can be released to attend to another patient.
The CRU team can remain with the patient for as long as is needed, there are no designated time slots, meaning the patient receives compassionate care and is supported appropriately until an action plan is put in place. The team works with the patient and carer to develop a plan of onwards support, sometimes involving other services in the Trust, or with third sector partners.
This means that patients experiencing a mental health emergency are seen quickly by mental health professionals, in a calm environment, instead of being conveyed to A&E which can be chaotic and difficult for the patient.
Co-production has been a significant part of the Crisis Response Unit service development. Working with previous users of crisis services and their carers, meant we were able to develop this service with dedicated attention given to elements that would support patients and carers in crisis. An example of this was the decision to have the vehicle unmarked, meaning patients could receive discreet care, and the provision of sensory lighting to support neurodiverse patients.
Key achievements of the CRU team in the first year:
- Received 1,356 referrals into the service – most of these have been through EMAS or the Trust’s 24-hour mental health number
- Deployed to support 704 patients face to face in the community
- Of those assessed face to face, the CRU achieved their 1-hour response target 412 times
- Of those assessed face to face, the support from the CRU prevented attendance at A&E on 633 occasions
- For patients where the CRU was not deployed, they were spoken to via telephone and advice was given to the ambulance service or other referrers
- Received a total of 2,939 patient contacts, including face to face and via telephone.
Not long after the CRU was launched, the team worked hard to establish a relationship with EMAS staff, to make them aware of the new service and the types of calls that could be referred. The CRU team developed some laminated cards that were made available to each EMAS vehicle to remind teams “don’t forget MH CRU” with the referral number. Since then, EMAS have been providing regular feedback to the CRU on things that are going well, in addition to areas for development.
It is really great to see this team making a difference, not only for to patients and carers, but also supporting colleagues across the healthcare system. Congratulations on the first year of operation and we look forward to hearing about further successes in the coming year.