August 22, 2012
Story and photo by Amy Crofts
After three successful years as a pilot project, the Police and Crisis Team (PACT) will continue to help people cope with mental illness in Grande Prairie and surrounding areas.
PACT is a mobile crisis team that provides mental health assessments in the community for people with psychiatric problems and who are experiencing crisis. The program is a joint initiative between Alberta Health Services, RCMP in Grande Prairie and Beaverlodge and the Canadian Mental Health Association.
A team consists of an RCMP member and a mental health professional such as a registered psychiatric nurse. They work with clients who come into contact with the law but do not necessarily require admission to the criminal justice system or hospital.
“RCMP members appreciate having this program because it takes a lot of stress off their jobs having to deal with these clients,” says Tricia Abar, a registered nurse with AHS who joined Grande Prairie’s PACT team last October.
Abar says that this partnership also frees up emergency and hospital services that would otherwise be occupied by mental health clients.
Between May 2010 and April 2011 PACT responded to 817 calls, only 49 of which were directed to the hospital during their operational hours of 9 am to 5 pm Monday through Friday.
The project was developed through the Safe Communities Initiative Fund – an initiative by the Government of Alberta to help police and community-based programs make neighborhoods safer - in 2009. Similar teams serve Calgary and Edmonton, but the Grande Prairie-based PACT team is most closely modeled to the Car 87 program in B.C., says former PACT member and RCMP Const. Violet MacFarlane.
She says PACT is a proactive response to the increasing number of people with mental illness involved in the criminal justice system. The program helps connect police – who lack the time and resources to effectively deal with this population – with community supports.
“Prior to having this joint communication, everyone was playing in their own sandbox,” says MacFarlane.” We didn’t know our shared clients, and so many resources were spent trying to re-invent the wheel.”
PACT averages 70-80 clients per month.
Team members respond to calls from police dispatch, community agencies and concerned family members. They works closely with community supports such as Rotary House and social work and counselling services at Nordic Court, to follow-up with clients and make appropriate referrals.
“We can make referrals, but we often never know if the person follows up or not,” says MacFarlane. “Now with our mobile response unit, we bring the follow-up to them.”
An evaluation of the program performed by Mount Royal University in Calgary found PACT connected clients to community resources sooner than if regular RCMP responded alone. Stakeholders have also reported that PACT is successfully filling gaps in service.
“A lot of people with mental illness think it’s a stigma to be diagnosed. But really it’s an illness just as diabetes is an illness,” says Abar.
PACT tries to reduce stigma and embarrassment placed on mental health clients by providing on-site assessments using an unmarked patrol car. However if the crisis cannot be resolved in the community, the RCMP can convey the client to the hospital for further assessment without doctor’s or judge’s orders.
