AGENCY TESTIMONY
Recent strategy changes to improve B-HEARD's effectiveness
0:50:22
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123 sec
Eva Wong outlines two new strategies recently implemented to enhance the B-HEARD program's ability to provide health-centered emergency crisis responses to as many New Yorkers as possible.
- The first strategy prioritizes sending B-HEARD teams to 911 mental health calls that have been fully triaged by EMS call takers as appropriate for a B-HEARD response.
- The second strategy involves switching from using police precincts as geographic boundaries to more flexible ones aligned with EMS unit dispatch areas.
- These changes aim to maximize the time B-HEARD teams spend serving patients and increase their ability to respond to the most appropriate calls efficiently.
Eva Wong
0:50:22
As the program has expanded to more communities, we have continually examined innovative ways to improve the be heard team's ability to get to more calls, as well as strengthen New York City's responses to mental health emergency calls.
0:50:36
Last week, the city announced 2 new strategies that have been implemented to strengthen BHIR's ability to provide as many new workers as possible with a health center emergency crisis response.
0:50:47
Their first strategy is prioritizing sending teams to 911 mental health calls that have been fully triaged by EMS call takers as appropriate for it be hurt response.
0:50:57
For almost a year, BHIR Teams were dispatched to a broader range of mental health calls, namely ones assigned to NYPD and or EMS, where eligibility for a BHIR response may not have been established yet during the call triaging process.
0:51:12
This did result in BEHARD Teams responding to more calls and a higher percentage of mental health 911 calls.
0:51:20
However, after monitoring this new approach closely, the city learned that these the teams were experiencing a higher number of instances where the patients were no longer on a scene or in need of their assistant when they responded to the cause that had not been fully triaged.
0:51:35
Therefore, the city will prioritize deploying be heard teams to cause that have been fully triaged by EMS 911 call takers to maximize a time be her team spend serving patients.
0:51:47
Couple with this approach, the city will be switching from using police precincts as geographic boundaries within the existing pilot area to flexible ones that are more aligned with how EMS units are dispatched.
0:52:01
This program modification will allow existing teams to be nimble in their ability to respond to nearby calls outside a precinct boundary once they have completed a call.
0:52:11
Rather than being confined to only responding to calls within certain precincts, the team would be given flexibility to go to calls that are more convenient from an operational standpoint, which will increase their ability to respond to the most appropriate calls.
