By Katy Human
The Denver Post
DENVER, Colo. — Mental-health care experts on the Front Range have a $12 million idea: They hope to open three 24-hour mental-health triage centers in the seven-county Denver metro area to take a huge burden off the justice system and emergency rooms.
The centers, the first of which could be open by the end of the year, would support a crisis phone line and would have professional staff who can assess and treat mental and behavioral health problems for up to three days, said Carl Clark, executive director of the Mental Health Center of Denver.
There are strict legal limits on the kinds of services that can be provided by either emergency rooms or police, Clark said, “so sometimes, no one gets help.”
Supporters of the Triage Project include Mental Health America of Colorado, local hospitals, providers, advocates and law enforcement leaders.
The project’s steering committee, which includes first lady Jeannie Ritter and Golden Police Chief Bill Kilpatrick, is searching for appropriate space to house the first center, said Heather Cameron, Triage Project director with Mental Health America of Colorado.
And the committee is looking for money, Cameron said.
Cameron estimated it will take about $12 million annually to fund three crisis centers, an information technology infrastructure and a call center.
Half of that might come from reimbursements by health insurance, she said, and the remaining $6 million, “well, that’s minuscule compared with the cost of emergency care and what we’re doing now.”
The project’s initial planning has been funded with about $220,000 from regional hospital owners Centura, Exempla and Health One, she said.
The Colorado Health Foundation kicked in another $300,000 last month, Cameron said, and in early May, Triage Project members will hear whether they’ll be awarded $500,000 from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation - with expected local matching funds.
“I really believe this is going to happen,” Kilpatrick said. “This project has the backing of a lot of people.”
40%
Estimated percentage of Colorado’s inmate population that has some type of mental disorder - about 35,000
$34.4 million
Additional amount spent annually to care for the 5,500 seriously mentally ill metro-county inmates
1,484
Average daily number of seriously mentally ill people jailed
in the metro area
$6,000-$8,000
Annual cost of treating a mentally ill person in the community
$60,000
Annual cost of incarcerating each mentally ill person
92 days
Additional time each seriously mentally ill inmate spends in jail
$6,249
Additional cost of that time per inmate
$599 million
What state spent in general-fund money on corrections in 2007
$37.5 million
What state spent in general-fund money on community mental-health services for the medically indigent
Source: Metro Area County
Copyright 2008 The Denver Post