Why lived experience changes what happens on a call — and the research behind that claim.
9 sources
Worthen, M., De Bourbon, S., Breedlove, O., Ewing, C., Graterol, J., Harmon, A., Hines, N., Lundgren, E., Mason, M., Marchiselli, M., Mendoza, V., Nguyen, K., Rubin, B., Sloan, A., & Maguen, S. (2026). We are still in it: A conceptual model for moral injury and burnout in alternative response programs to guide intervention.Frontiers in Psychiatry, 17, Article 1735265. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2026.1735265
Fortuna, K. L., Cui, S., Lebby, S., Xie, H., Bruce, M. L., & Bartels, S. J. (2025). PeerTECH: A randomized controlled trial of a peer-led mobile health intervention to improve medical and psychiatric self-management for persons with serious mental illness.mHealth, 11, Article 28. https://doi.org/10.21037/mhealth-24-64On peers: A randomized trial in which certified peer support specialists delivered a structured mobile health intervention, producing statistically significant improvements in physical health outcomes for people with serious mental illness.
Brinkley, A., & Volpe, J. (2024). Peer support services across the crisis continuum (Publication No. PEP24-01-019). Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. https://988crisissystemshelp.samhsa.gov/sites/default/files/2024-09/tacc-peer-support-services-pep24-01-019.pdfOn peers: A SAMHSA technical assistance report offering promising and best practices for integrating peer support workers into the full crisis continuum, including mobile crisis response.
McDaniel, M., Sundaram, S., Manjanatha, D., Odes, R., Lerman, P., Handley, M. A., et al. (2024). “They made me feel like I mattered”: A qualitative study of how mobile crisis teams can support people experiencing homelessness.BMC Public Health, 24(1), 2183. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-024-19596-2On peers: A qualitative study of San Francisco’s own street crisis clients. Local evidence that how a crisis team treats someone — whether they are met with dignity — is noticed, remembered, and worth measuring.
Townley, G., Sand, K., Kindschuh, T., Brott, H., & Leickly, E. (2021). Engaging unhoused community members in the design of an alternative first responder program aimed at reducing the criminalization of homelessness.Journal of Community Psychology.https://doi.org/10.1002/jcop.22601On peers: Brought unhoused community members into the design of an alternative first responder program, showing how the people actually served define a successful interaction in their own terms.
Shalaby, R. A. H., & Agyapong, V. I. O. (2020). Peer support in mental health: Literature review.JMIR Mental Health, 7(6), Article e15572. https://doi.org/10.2196/15572On peers: A broadly cited literature review supporting the inclusion of peer support workers in the mental health care workforce, documenting benefits including fewer psychiatric hospitalizations and greater hope, empowerment, and engagement in treatment.
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2020). National guidelines for behavioral health crisis care: A best practice toolkit. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. https://bja.ojp.gov/sites/g/files/xyckuh186/files/media/document/samsha-national-guidelines.pdfOn peers: Sets federal best-practice standards for crisis care; its mobile crisis team guidance describes a behavioral health professional and peer support working together during mobile crisis interventions.
Davidson, L., Chinman, M., Sells, D., & Rowe, M. (2006). Peer support among adults with serious mental illness: A report from the field.Schizophrenia Bulletin, 32(3), 443–450. https://doi.org/10.1093/schbul/sbj043On peers: Foundational report on peer support among adults with serious mental illness, grounding the field's premise that people who have faced, endured, and overcome adversity can offer support, encouragement, hope, and mentorship to others facing similar situations.
What the evidence shows
Studies of alternative crisis response teams: arrests, hospitalizations, emergency room visits, and safety.
11 sources
Peters, R. L., Fine, J., Newton, H., Dalack, G. W., Watson, A., & Lich, K. H. (2025). Mobile crisis effectiveness: A systematic review and associated functions and forms framework.BMC Health Services Research, 26, Article 60. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-025-13806-2On peers: Systematic review finding tentative support for mobile crisis unit effectiveness in reducing emergency department visits, inpatient admissions, and arrests. Identifies incorporating peer support specialists as a SAMHSA best practice for mobile crisis teams, and names research on the role of peer recovery specialists on these teams as a top priority.
Davis, J., Norris, S., Schmitt, J., Shem-Tov, Y., & Strickland, C. (2025). Mobile crisis response teams support better policing: Evidence from CAHOOTS (NBER Working Paper No. 33761). National Bureau of Economic Research. https://doi.org/10.3386/w33761On peers: The first causal evaluation of CAHOOTS — non-uniformed two-person teams of a mental health worker and a medic — found that program expansions reduced the likelihood that a 911 call ended in arrest and increased access to medical services, largely by de-escalating tense situations and resolving incidents without coercive measures. The teams function as a complement to police, not merely a substitute.
Swanson, L., Zettner, C., Watson, A., Hinojosa, M., Roddy, J., & Kubiak, S. (2025). Eleven-month arrest outcomes among three crisis response models in Michigan.Psychiatric Research and Clinical Practice.https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.prcp.20240099On peers: Linked law enforcement and provider records across five Michigan counties to compare three crisis response models. Mobile crisis was the only model that significantly reduced arrest over the following year.
Balfour, M. E., Hahn Stephenson, A., Delany-Brumsey, A., Winsky, J., & Goldman, M. L. (2022). Cops, clinicians, or both? Collaborative approaches to responding to behavioral health emergencies.Psychiatric Services, 73(6), 658–669. https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.ps.202000721On peers: Reviews the spectrum of collaborative crisis response models — from police-based to co-responder to community behavioral health teams — and how communities can divert behavioral health emergencies away from law enforcement and emergency departments.
Dee, T. S., & Pyne, J. (2022). A community response approach to mental health and substance abuse crises reduced crime.Science Advances, 8(23), eabm2106. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abm2106On peers: Preregistered quasi-experimental evaluation of Denver's STAR pilot, which sent health-focused responders instead of police to targeted 911 calls. The program reduced reports of targeted, less serious crimes by 34% with no detectable effect on more serious crimes, at direct costs roughly four times lower than a police response — the strongest causal evidence yet for the community-response model that peer-inclusive teams like SCRT embody.
Abramson, A. (2021). Building mental health into emergency responses.Monitor on Psychology, 52(5). https://www.apa.org/monitor/2021/07/emergency-responsesContext: American Psychological Association overview of the national shift toward building behavioral health expertise into emergency response, widely cited for the estimate that a substantial share of 911 calls involve a mental health component — the call volume that alternative response teams exist to absorb.
Fendrich, M., Ives, M., Kurz, B., Becker, J., Vanderploeg, J., Bory, C., Lin, H.-J., & Plant, R. (2019). Impact of mobile crisis services on emergency department use among youths with behavioral health service needs.Psychiatric Services, 70(10), 881–887. https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.ps.201800450On peers: Evaluated Connecticut's community-based mobile crisis service, providing evidence that mobile crisis reduces emergency department use among youths with behavioral health service needs.
Fuller, D. A., Lamb, H. R., Biasotti, M., & Snook, J. (2015). Overlooked in the undercounted: The role of mental illness in fatal law enforcement encounters. Treatment Advocacy Center. https://www.tac.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Overlooked-in-the-Undercounted.pdfContext: Estimated that at least 1 in 4 fatal police encounters ends the life of a person with severe mental illness, and that the risk of being killed during a police incident is 16 times greater for individuals with untreated serious mental illness — the core safety argument for sending responders other than law enforcement to behavioral health calls.
Currier, G. W., Fisher, S. G., & Caine, E. D. (2010). Mobile crisis team intervention to enhance linkage of discharged suicidal emergency department patients to outpatient psychiatric services: A randomized controlled trial.Academic Emergency Medicine, 17(1), 36–43. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1553-2712.2009.00619.xContext: The only U.S. randomized trial of mobile crisis intervention, testing whether it succeeds in connecting discharged emergency department patients to ongoing outpatient care.
Guo, S., Biegel, D. E., Johnsen, J. A., & Dyches, H. (2001). Assessing the impact of community-based mobile crisis services on preventing hospitalization.Psychiatric Services, 52(2), 223–228. https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.ps.52.2.223On peers: A seminal quasi-experimental evaluation finding that people in crisis who received hospital-based intervention were 51% more likely to be hospitalized within 30 days than those served by a community-based mobile crisis team.
National Alliance on Mental Illness. (n.d.). Criminalization of people with mental illness. Retrieved July 27, 2026, from https://www.nami.org/advocacy-at-nami/policy-positions/stopping-harmful-practices/criminalization-of-people-with-mental-illness/Context: NAMI's policy position opposing the criminalization of mental illness: roughly 2 million jail bookings each year involve people with serious mental illness, and about 2 in 5 incarcerated people have a mental illness history. Robust crisis response infrastructure is named among the essential remedies.
San Francisco’s own record
The City’s public documents on the Street Crisis Response Team, and outside accounts of how it has worked.
6 sources
Fielder, J. (2026, July 30). Letter to the San Francisco Fire Commission: Agendizing Peer Counselors.Context: Supervisor Jackie Fielder’s formal request that the SCRT restructuring be placed on the Fire Commission’s August 12 agenda, and that no permanent staffing changes take effect until the change had been publicly reviewed.
Office of the Mayor, City & County of San Francisco. (2025). Breaking the Cycle (Executive Directive 25-02). https://www.sf.govContext: The Mayor’s directive on coordinating San Francisco’s street response — the citywide alignment framework these recommendations are designed to serve rather than compete with.
City & County of San Francisco. (n.d.). Street Crisis Response Team.https://www.sf.gov/street-crisis-response-teamContext: The City’s own description of the Street Crisis Response Team and how it is currently staffed.
CSG Justice Center. (n.d.). Expanding first response — San Francisco, CA program profile.https://csgjusticecenter.org/publications/expanding-first-response/san-francisco-ca/Context: An outside profile of San Francisco’s first response expansion, including team composition and the roughly 14,230 calls handled between November 2020 and November 2022.
How other places do it
Crisis teams and peer classifications in other cities, counties, and states — plus the national field itself.
10 sources
Policing Project at NYU School of Law, Georgetown Law Center for Innovations in Community Safety, & Alternative Mobile Services Association. (2026). Advancing the Field of Alternative Response Convening: Establishing Permanence. Chicago, IL, June 4–5, 2026. https://www.policingproject.org/eventsContext: The annual national gathering of the alternative response field, focused on establishing this work as a recognized profession and a durable part of public safety systems rather than a pilot that comes and goes.
CrisisCon. (2026). The National Crisis Continuum Conference (CrisisCon26). Crisis Residential Association & International Council for Helplines. https://www.crisiscon.orgContext: The national convening covering the full continuum of crisis services — the wider system that mobile crisis teams hand people off into.
Watson, A. C., McNally, K., Pope, L. G., & Compton, M. T. (2025). If not police, then who? Building a new workforce for community behavioral health crisis response.Frontiers in Psychology, 16, Article 1579787. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1579787
County of Orange Health Care Agency. (2024). Certified Peer Support Specialist (Mental Health Worker III) [Recruitment posting]. https://www.governmentjobs.com/careers/ocOn peers: A California county job posting for a certified peer classified inside its health worker series and assigned to mobile crisis field work — the closest structural precedent for giving peer counselors a permanent civil service classification.
NRI. (2024). State mobile crisis teams 2023 [Profiles report]. https://nri-inc.org/media/1xai5vsn/profiles-mobile-crisis-teams-2023.pdfContext: Documents more than 1,820 mobile crisis teams operating across all 50 states — the national scale at which lessons from San Francisco’s program would travel.
Waters, R. (2021). Enlisting mental health workers, not cops, in mobile crisis response.Health Affairs, 40(6), 864–869. https://doi.org/10.1377/hlthaff.2021.00678On peers: Chronicles the history, operations, and finances of CAHOOTS in Eugene, Oregon, examining how teams of mental health workers — not police — respond to crisis calls and reduce emergency response costs.
Downtown Emergency Service Center. (n.d.). Mobile Rapid Response Crisis Team.https://desc.org/what-we-do/crisis-response/On peers: Seattle’s county-funded crisis teams, pairing peer counselors with behavioral health professionals, with more than a decade of field history behind them.
Pennsylvania Peer Support Coalition. (n.d.). Civil service employment.https://papeersupportcoalition.org/employment/civil-service-employment/On peers: Pennsylvania’s statewide civil service classification for Certified Peer Specialists — peers as classified government employees in state hospitals and county offices, not contractors.
U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. (n.d.). Peer Specialist positions, Veterans Crisis Line / Peer Support Outreach Center.https://www.usajobs.govOn peers: Peer specialist as a permanent federal job title doing crisis work at national scale — precedent that this role can be classified and made durable.
Training and credentialing
The certification pathways and training standards a tiered peer role would be built on.
7 sources
Richmond, J. S., Berlin, J. S., Fishkind, A. B., Holloman, G. H., Zeller, S. L., Wilson, M. P., Rifai, M. A., & Ng, A. T. (2012). Verbal de-escalation of the agitated patient: Consensus statement of the American Association for Emergency Psychiatry Project BETA De-escalation Workgroup.Western Journal of Emergency Medicine, 13(1), 17–25. https://doi.org/10.5811/westjem.2011.9.6864Context: Establishes verbal de-escalation as a definable clinical practice with specific, checkable elements — the basis for treating it as a trainable skill rather than a personality trait.
California Mental Health Services Authority / California Peer Certification. (n.d.). RAMS provider listing — approved training provider, Medi-Cal Peer Support Specialist Certificate course.https://www.capeercertification.org/rams/On peers: Establishes RAMS as a state-approved certification training provider, with more than ten years of peer training history.
Crisis Prevention Institute. (n.d.). Nationally recognized de-escalation and crisis prevention training.https://www.crisisprevention.comContext: The de-escalation and crisis prevention curriculum used as a standard training component across health care and public safety settings.
San Francisco Police Department. (n.d.). DGO 5.21 — Crisis Intervention Team response to person in crisis calls for service.https://www.sanfranciscopolice.org/your-sfpd/policies/general-orders/5-21Context: The general order defining the 40-hour state-certified crisis intervention course referenced in the tiered training standard.
Law, funding, and payment
The statutes and payment rules that decide what crisis work gets reimbursed, and by whom.
21 sources
Blumenthal, D., Gumas, E. D., Shah, A., Gunja, M. Z., & Williams, R. D., II. (2024). Mirror, mirror 2024: A portrait of the failing U.S. health system — Comparing performance in 10 nations. The Commonwealth Fund. https://doi.org/10.26099/ta0g-zp66Context: The Commonwealth Fund's ten-nation comparison finding the U.S. spends the most on health care while ranking last on overall performance — the system-level backdrop for investing in lower-cost, community-based models of care rather than defaulting to the most expensive settings.
Department of Health Care Services. (2023). BHIN 23-025: Medi-Cal mobile crisis services benefit implementation.https://www.dhcs.ca.gov/Documents/BHIN-23-025-MediCal-Mobile-Crisis-Services-Benefit-Implementation.pdfOn peers: California’s implementation instruction for the Medi-Cal mobile crisis benefit. Its table of qualifying team members includes the certified peer support specialist — the provision that makes peer participation billable.
American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, Pub. L. No. 117-2, § 9813, 135 Stat. 4 (2021). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/PLAW-117publ2/html/PLAW-117publ2.htmContext: Section 9813 created the Medicaid state option and 85% enhanced federal match for qualifying community-based mobile crisis intervention services — the funding authority under which California reimburses mobile crisis response, and the fiscal foundation of the case that removing reimbursable team members forfeits federal revenue.
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. (2021). SHO# 21-008: Medicaid guidance on the scope of and payments for qualifying community-based mobile crisis intervention services. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. https://www.medicaid.gov/federal-policy-guidance/downloads/sho21008.pdfOn peers: The federal guidance implementing the ARPA mobile crisis benefit. It describes qualifying team services as including peer support and mentorship, and directs teams to link people served with recovery community centers and other peer-led organizations — federal payment policy that treats peers as part of the qualifying mobile crisis team.
Karaca, Z., & Moore, B. J. (2020). Costs of emergency department visits for mental and substance use disorders in the United States, 2017 (HCUP Statistical Brief No. 257). Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. https://hcup-us.ahrq.gov/reports/statbriefs/sb257-ED-Costs-Mental-Substance-Use-Disorders-2017.jspContext: Federal analysis finding that 10.7 million emergency department visits for mental and substance use disorders carried more than $5.6 billion in service delivery costs in 2017, with Medicaid the largest payer for several of the costliest diagnoses — the downstream costs that community-based crisis response is designed to avert.
National Suicide Hotline Designation Act of 2020, Pub. L. No. 116-172, 134 Stat. 832 (2020). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/PLAW-116publ172/html/PLAW-116publ172.htmContext: Designated 9-8-8 as the universal number for the national suicide prevention and mental health crisis line, anchoring the crisis continuum — someone to call, someone to respond, somewhere to go — in which mobile crisis teams are the "someone to respond."
S.B. 803, 2019–2020 Reg. Sess., ch. 150, 2020 Cal. Stat. (Mental Health Services: Peer Support Specialist Certification Program Act of 2020). https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200SB803On peers: California's Peer Support Specialist Certification Program Act, authored by Senator Jim Beall. Established statewide certification, training, and supervision standards for peer support specialists and created the pathway for counties to bill Medi-Cal for peer-delivered services — the credentialing backbone that makes certified peer work on crisis teams reimbursable.
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2014). Crisis services: Effectiveness, cost-effectiveness, and funding strategies (HHS Publication No. SMA-14-4848). U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. https://library.samhsa.gov/sites/default/files/sma14-4848.pdfOn peers: SAMHSA's foundational review of the crisis-services evidence base and financing landscape. Documents that peer crisis services produced greater symptom improvement than locked inpatient care at dramatically lower cost ($211 versus $665 per day in a randomized trial), and that 15 states were already funding peer crisis services through Medicaid a decade ago.
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. (n.d.). Behavioral health services. Medicaid.gov. Retrieved July 27, 2026, from https://www.medicaid.gov/medicaid/benefits/behavioral-health-servicesContext: CMS's hub for Medicaid behavioral health policy — Medicaid is the single largest payer for mental health services in the United States — including the state option for qualifying community-based mobile crisis intervention services and federal guidance on Medicaid coverage of peer support services.
Department of Health Care Services. (n.d.). Medi-Cal peer support services (SB 803 benefit; county opt-in status). https://www.dhcs.ca.gov/services/medical-peer-support-services/On peers: California’s peer support benefit and which counties have opted in — 53 of 58 and counting.
Department of Health Care Services. (n.d.). Mobile crisis services (CalAIM initiative overview). https://www.dhcs.ca.gov/mobile-crisis-services/Context: Program-level overview of California’s mobile crisis benefit.
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation. (n.d.). Crisis services billed to Medicaid.https://aspe.hhs.govContext: Documents how states bill Medicaid for crisis services, including the specific code used for mobile crisis encounters.
National Association of State Health Policy. (n.d.). Mobile crisis: Maximizing new Medicaid opportunities.https://nashp.org/mobile-crisis-maximizing-new-medicaid-opportunities/Context: Georgia’s payment strategies for crisis services, including claiming Medicaid dollars for crisis infrastructure itself.
How to measure it
Evaluation designs and measurement tools — how you find out whether any of this is working.
U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. (2025). National summary of homeless system performance, 2020–2024. HUD Exchange.
Context: National benchmarks for the seven standard measures of how well a homelessness response system performs, including returns to homelessness and placements into permanent housing.
Vakkalanka, J. P., Neuhaus, R., Harland, K., Clemsen, L., Himadi, E., & Lee, S. (2021). Mobile crisis outreach and emergency department utilization: A propensity score-matched analysis.Western Journal of Emergency Medicine, 22(5), 1086–1094.
Context: A design warning. Comparison groups differing sharply in housing status made emergency department revisit comparisons uninterpretable. For a population that is overwhelmingly unhoused, housing status has to be accounted for in any honest evaluation.
Finkelstein, A., Zhou, A., Taubman, S., & Doyle, J. (2020). Health care hotspotting — a randomized, controlled trial.New England Journal of Medicine, 382(2), 152–162. https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMsa1906848Context: The Camden Coalition trial. Apparent improvements among frequent utilizers vanished once measured against a randomized control group — the clearest argument for why a crisis program needs a real comparison design, not just before-and-after numbers.
American Association for Community Psychiatry. (2020). Level of Care Utilization System (LOCUS) for psychiatric and addiction services (Version 20). https://www.communitypsychiatry.org/keystone-programs/locusContext: The standard tool for rating what level of care a person needs. Scored over time, it offers one way to see whether someone is moving toward stability rather than cycling in place.
Vanderploeg, J. J., Lu, J. J., Marshall, T. M., & Stevens, K. (2016). Mobile crisis services for children and families: Advancing a community-based model in Connecticut.Children and Youth Services Review, 71, 103–109. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.childyouth.2016.10.034Context: Demonstrates measuring how clients are functioning from intake through discharge inside a statewide mobile crisis program.
Holland, J., & Tran, T. V. (2010). The use of social workers’ emergency certificates and factors associated with linkage to services.Social Work in Mental Health, 8(6), 495–509. https://doi.org/10.1080/15332981003744438Context: A methods caution. Lumping different kinds of service connection into a single “linkage” variable made the findings impossible to interpret — linkage has to be defined as discrete, dated, verifiable events.
Larimer, M. E., Malone, D. K., Garner, M. D., Atkins, D. C., Burlingham, B., Lonczak, H. S., et al. (2009). Health care and public service use and costs before and after provision of housing for chronically homeless persons with severe alcohol problems.JAMA, 301(13), 1349–1357. https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.2009.414Context: The Seattle 1811 Eastlake study, tracking what one group of people cost public systems before and after they were housed — and showing that monthly cross-system cost can be followed per person.
Sadowski, L. S., Kee, R. A., VanderWeele, T. J., & Buchanan, D. (2009). Effect of a housing and case management program on emergency department visits and hospitalizations among chronically ill homeless adults: A randomized trial.JAMA, 301(17), 1771–1778. https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.2009.561Context: A randomized trial linking housing and health care use in a single group of people followed through both systems at once.
Tsemberis, S., Gulcur, L., & Nakae, M. (2004). Housing First, consumer choice, and harm reduction for homeless individuals with a dual diagnosis.American Journal of Public Health, 94(4), 651–656. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.94.4.651Context: The canonical Housing First paper, establishing days housed as a rigorous outcome for exactly the population street crisis teams encounter.
Culhane, D. P., Metraux, S., & Hadley, T. (2002). Public service reductions associated with placement of homeless persons with severe mental illness in supportive housing.Housing Policy Debate, 13(1), 107–163. https://doi.org/10.1080/10511482.2002.9521437Context: The landmark cross-sector cost study, following one group of people across seven public systems — the blueprint for measuring what crisis response costs and saves across departments rather than within one budget.
Dyches, H., Biegel, D. E., Johnsen, J. A., Guo, S., & Min, M. O. (2002). The impact of mobile crisis services on the use of community-based mental health services.Research on Social Work Practice, 12(6), 731–751. https://doi.org/10.1177/104973102237469Context: Measured 90-day community service use from county administrative records — a study design available to any health department using data it already holds.
Swift, R. H., Harrigan, E. P., Cappelleri, J. C., Kramer, D., & Chandler, L. P. (2002). Validation of the Behavioural Activity Rating Scale (BARS).Journal of Psychiatric Research, 36(2), 87–95. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0022-3956(01)00052-8On peers: Validation of the agitation scale SCRT already uses. Scoring it at first contact and again at the end of an encounter turns de-escalation — the peer’s signature skill — into a measurable change rather than an impression.
Tait, L., Birchwood, M., & Trower, P. (2002). A new scale (SES) to measure engagement with community mental health services.Journal of Mental Health, 11(2), 191–198. https://doi.org/10.1080/09638230020023570-2On peers: The most widely used instrument for measuring engagement with mental health services, built for outreach populations closely resembling street crisis clients.
Ogles, B. M., Melendez, G., Davis, D. C., & Lunnen, K. M. (2001). The Ohio Scales: Practical outcome assessment.Journal of Child and Family Studies, 10(2), 199–212. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1016651508801Context: A template for picking an outcome measure practical enough to complete inside routine paperwork instead of adding a research burden on top of the job.
Miller, W. R., & Tonigan, J. S. (1996). Assessing drinkers’ motivation for change: The Stages of Change Readiness and Treatment Eagerness Scale (SOCRATES).Psychology of Addictive Behaviors, 10(2), 81–89. https://doi.org/10.1037/0893-164X.10.2.81Context: A readiness-to-change instrument for substance use. Given at treatment intake, it can test whether people who arrive through engagement differ from people who arrive through coercion.
Geller, J., Fisher, W., & McDermeit, M. (1995). A national survey of mobile crisis services and their evaluation.Psychiatric Services, 46(9), 893–897. https://doi.org/10.1176/ps.46.9.893Context: A thirty-year-old warning that mobile crisis had spread widely on very little evidence. The field still lacks standardized measures — the gap a rigorous evaluation here would help close.
Horvath, A. O., & Greenberg, L. S. (1989). Development and validation of the Working Alliance Inventory.Journal of Counseling Psychology, 36(2), 223–233. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0167.36.2.223On peers: The standard measure of working alliance — the quality of the relationship between a helper and the person being helped. Its short form can test whether the alliance formed with a peer differs from the one formed with a uniformed responder.
McConnaughy, E. A., Prochaska, J. O., & Velicer, W. F. (1983). Stages of change in psychotherapy: Measurement and sample profiles.Psychotherapy: Theory, Research & Practice, 20(3), 368–375. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0090198Context: Introduces the standard questionnaire for locating where a person sits on the continuum from not considering change to actively working on it.
Prochaska, J. O., & DiClemente, C. C. (1983). Stages and processes of self-change of smoking: Toward an integrative model of change.Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 51(3), 390–395. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-006X.51.3.390Context: The foundational stages-of-change paper and the source of the precontemplative and contemplative vocabulary — the theory behind counting movement toward readiness as a real result rather than a soft one.