Research in Brief: "911, Do You Need Police, Fire, EMS, or Mental Health Services?"

Police Chief Magazine|Columns|Research in Brief|Research in Brief: “911, Do You Need Police, Fire, EMS, or Mental Health Services?”

Research in Brief: “911, Do You Need Police, Fire, EMS, or Mental Health Services?”

Initial Evidence of the Value of a Fourth Option

Ken Murphy, Lieutenant, Austin Police Department, Texas, Emergency Communications Division; Jonathan Allen Kringen, PhD, Chief Data Officer, Austin Police Department, Associate Professor, University of New Haven, Connecticut

Up to 10 percent of police time involves responding to mental health calls, and individuals with mental illness (IMI) have three to five times more contact with police than individuals without mental illnesses.¹