First Access Behavioral Health

First access behavioral health provides mental health awareness and de- escalatioin training to first responders, including fire departments, ambulance districts and law enforcement agencies to develop their understanding of the signs and symptoms of mental illness and to teach de- escalation techniques that can be utilzed when responding to a mental health crisis. First access behavioral health provides training utilizing the evidence-based programs of mental health first aid and solution-focused brief intervention and will provide resource materials and linkages to community-based mental health agencies for the general population across the state of missouri. The goal of this service is to increase the number of first responders to include law enforcement, emergency medical services or fire departments trained to respond to mental health needs and crisis in the heneral population. As of december 31, 2024, one quarter into year two of the grant, substance abuse and mental health services administration, the agency has trained 763 persons through it's strengthening the mental health culture training program, which well exceeds the three-year project goal of 200 persons served. The majority of the persons trained were career firefighters/paramedics employed through fire departments, ambulance districts and on of missouri's fire training schools. This has been accomplished through building relationsships statewide with first responding agencies and offering a training program that directly relates and responds to their needs and unique situation. During this same time period, respondents reported 1334 persons have been referred to behavioral health services as a result of their increased knowledge of mental health, as a result of the fabh training and 93% of trainees experienced a change in knowledge from pretest to post test.

Missouri senate bill 24, now law effective as of august 28, 2023, is officially the missouri first responder mental health initiative act. The law does several major things to expand protections and support for first responders, including telecommunicators (911 dispatchers). First access behavioral health's ceo has been instrumental in supporting the development and implementation of the four key provisions, noted below, through regional education and consultation with lawmakers, first responding agencies and other providers. 1) it ensures first responders have the right to access behavioral and mental health care services, including treatment for ptsd, under certain terms (geographic flexibility, confidentiality, etc). 2) it establishes a first responder behavioral health grant program through which eligible first responders can be reimbursed for behavioral health care expenses, peer support, training and related services. 3) the bill also expands a voluntary "critical illness benefits pool" (previously only for firefighters and cancer victims) to include first responders more broadly (emts, telecommunicators) to cover diagnosable trauma stress events or cumulative post-traumatic stress injuries. 4) there are protections for confidentiality of peer support counseling: communications in peer support sessions are to be confidential, employers can't force someone to participate and there are penalties for advisors who violate confidentiality.