Enhanc­ing Behav­ioral Health Cri­sis Care in Part­ner­ship with NorthShore Uni­ver­si­ty HealthSystem

April 06, 2023

Ken­neth Young Cen­ter is hon­ored to announce that NorthShore, includ­ing Swedish and North­west Com­mu­ni­ty Health­care, has gen­er­ous­ly award­ed a $600,000 grant to enhance our mobile behav­ioral health cri­sis response programs.

When com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers are in an emer­gency men­tal health cri­sis and are in dan­ger of harm­ing them­selves or oth­ers, it’s imper­a­tive for their well­be­ing that they receive swift and appro­pri­ate behav­ioral health care. Con­nect­ing with pro­fes­sion­al behav­ioral health sup­port helps indi­vid­u­als not only meet their imme­di­ate needs, but builds a path­way to achieve their long-term goals through ongo­ing sup­port. KYC’s team of men­tal health cri­sis work­ers work to build trust and estab­lish an under­stand­ing of the individual’s expe­ri­ence, while pre­vent­ing unnec­es­sary insti­tu­tion­al­iza­tion, incar­cer­a­tion, or cycli­cal hospitalization.

NorthShore’s part­ner­ship will fund four key ele­ments of KYC’s grow­ing cri­sis response ser­vices, includ­ing 988 response.

Cre­at­ing a Safe Mobile Ther­a­py Space

NorthShore’s fund­ing will sup­port the pur­chase and ren­o­va­tion of a vehi­cle to cre­ate a mobile ther­a­py space to facil­i­tate behav­ioral health­care in the com­mu­ni­ty. Espe­cial­ly for indi­vid­u­als cur­rent­ly expe­ri­enc­ing home­less­ness and those who do not feel safe in their own homes, hav­ing a warm, safe, neu­tral space in which to con­nect with a men­tal health cri­sis work­er is key to ensur­ing imme­di­ate safety. 

Enhanc­ing Safe­ty for Cri­sis Workers

To ensure the safe­ty of our staff, NorthShore’s fund­ing will enable the imple­men­ta­tion of a mobile safe­ty sys­tem. Mobile cri­sis work­ers will uti­lize the sys­tem to send safe­ty updates to oth­er team mem­bers. If a sit­u­a­tion should arise in which addi­tion­al sup­port is need­ed to de-esca­late a cri­sis, the sys­tem can be used to swift­ly call for addi­tion­al sup­port or emer­gency first respon­der assistance. 

Cre­at­ing Effi­cien­cies for Service

This grant will fund a new admin­is­tra­tive posi­tion to sup­port our cri­sis teams. The cre­ation of this role will enable trained clin­i­cal staff to focus on respond­ing to crises and pro­vid­ing fol­low-up care direct­ly to clients. 

Pro­vid­ing Direct Cri­sis Service

NorthShore’s fund­ing will also pro­vide direct ser­vice, ensur­ing our com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers have access to cru­cial cri­sis care.

Thank You, NorthShore

We are incred­i­bly grate­ful for NorthShore’s impact­ful part­ner­ship. Their fund­ing will enable life-sav­ing pro­grams to be accessed by our com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers when they need it most. It’s through strong part­ners like NorthShore that we can tru­ly live our vision: Togeth­er We Thrive.

About NorthShore – Edward-Elmhurst Health

NorthShore – Edward-Elmhurst Health is a ful­ly inte­grat­ed health­care deliv­ery sys­tem com­mit­ted to pro­vid­ing access to qual­i­ty, vibrant, com­mu­ni­ty-con­nect­ed care, serv­ing an area of more than 4.2 mil­lion res­i­dents across six north­east Illi­nois coun­ties. Their more than 25,000 team mem­bers and more than 6,000 physi­cians aim to deliv­er trans­for­ma­tive patient expe­ri­ences and expert care close to home across more than 300 ambu­la­to­ry loca­tions and eight acute care hos­pi­tals – Edward (Naperville), Elmhurst, Evanston, Glen­brook (Glen­view), High­land Park, North­west Com­mu­ni­ty (Arling­ton Heights) Skok­ie and Swedish (Chica­go) – all rec­og­nized as Mag­net hos­pi­tals for nurs­ing excel­lence. Locat­ed in Naperville, Lin­den Oaks Behav­ioral Health, pro­vides for the men­tal health needs of area residents.

NorthShore’s Com­mu­ni­ty Invest­ment Fund (CIF) gen­er­ous­ly award­ed $4 mil­lion in grant sup­port across fif­teen local orga­ni­za­tions in 2023, and Ken­neth Young Cen­ter is hon­ored to be among these impact­ful com­mu­ni­ty orga­ni­za­tions. NorthShore’s CIF began last year as part of the merg­er between NorthShore Uni­ver­si­ty Health­Sys­tem and Edward-Elmhurst Health, demon­strat­ing the orga­ni­za­tions’ com­mit­ment to vibrant, com­mu­ni­ty-con­nect­ed care.

For more infor­ma­tion, vis­it NorthShore​.org, Swedish​Covenant​.org, NCH​.org and EEHealth​.org.

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