People are posed with stressful life events and situations with relative frequency. It has been well documented that "stress" and "poor coping skills" correlates highly with a range of mental and physical illnesses. There have been trends to hospitalize people, or for people to attend to a hospital emergency department regarding their social problems. This is not only an expensive way of "caring", but in many ways inappropriate and an ineffective way to de-escalate crisis situations.

Effective crisis intervention prevents situations from escalating to the point where there are limited options and unnecessary hospital admissions. The point of a crisis is the time (and for many, the only time) that people will accept help to resolve their problems. Crisis workers have the flexibility of helping someone in the office, by telephone, or by attending in the community to the place of crisis.

Crisis intervention deliberately avoids becoming involved in long-term matters and the focus is on the "here and now". This is often the only kind of help or treatment an individual wants or needs. The work of the crisis worker is to empower people (e.g., learn effective problem-solving and networking skills) such that they become more self-reliant, and less dependent upon outside resources.

A BRIDGE TO MAINSTREAM SERVICES

Mobile Crisis Services performs a community "triage function" acting as a point of entry for people into various service systems. Crisis workers perform thorough assessments and make referrals helping people secure needed resources. This ensures that people utilize the right service specific to their problem rather than accessing more expensive or inappropriate service systems.

Close linkages to other line agencies in the community not only ensures accessibility to those who most need services, but increases the "after hours" capabilities of other service providers.

SERVICE CO-ORDINATION

Mobile Crisis Services closely consults with, and collaborates with other service providers, i.e., hospitals, police, ambulance services, safe shelters, mental health services, and other community service systems.

FILLS GAPS IN HEALTH AND COMMUNITY SERVICES

There are a number of variables that exist in any community which provide the potential for crises such as crime, community conflict, poverty, anti-social behaviour, housing problems, unemployment, homicide, and tragic events. Crisis workers use their skills to evaluate the interfaces between the individual and the community. At the same time, crisis workers enable people to develop better coping skills, access to information, and opportunities for making healthy decisions and informed choices. Therefore, crisis intervention represents a socio-ecological approach to helping people in that it views the whole person in the context of the community, and their relationships with natural helping networks. In this way, crisis workers readily identify gaps in service delivery, which is instrumental in the development of new resources and the extension of existing services.

ACCESSIBILITY

The cornerstone of effective crisis intervention services is accessibility. Mobile Crisis Services can be accessed seven days a week, 24 hours a day by telephone:

Mobile Crisis Services - 757-0127
Child Abuse Line - 569-2724
Crisis Line - 525-5333
Gambling Help Line - 1-800-306-6789

Sask Tel operators and the Sask Tel Relay Centre (service for the hearing impaired) can also directly transmit a call to Mobile Crisis Services, staying on the line to assist if necessary. In the event that all staff are out of the office responding to crisis calls in the community, the agency's answering service can be accessed through a commercial paging service. As crisis workers always carry a police radio, they can be directly accessed by the Regina Police Service at any time. Mobile Crisis Services also has a direct telephone extension to the Regina Police Service. Mobile Crisis Services is wheelchair-accessible and a telewriter is available for persons with a hearing impairment to make phone calls from our office.

BROAD SERVICE MANDATE

Over the years, Mobile Crisis Services has found that, as social and health services have become more specialized, those least able to negotiate these complex systems fall between the service delivery cracks. Most often, the elderly, the poor, single parents, First Nations people, and others who have limited political, social, and economic status have difficulty obtaining the services they need. Operating as a service not limited to "special types of clients", with "special problems", services provided by Mobile Crisis Services are not limited to "defined service boundaries", or waiting lists. Our agency takes the approach that a crisis is not a pathological state, but given unfortunate circumstances is something that can happen to any individual at any time. While Mobile Crisis Services staff provide services from a generalist perspective, they also have highly specialized knowledge and skills in assessing services for special needs groups.

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