BEST Partnership for Behavioral Health, Racial, and Social Justice

The Mission of the BEST Partnership for Behavioral Health and Racial and Social Justice is to improve outcomes for individuals with behavioral health challenges involved in the criminal justice system through services, training and evaluation/research and by addressing racial and social disparities.

Current Partnership Services:
For the Greater Boston community, BEST currently partners with the City of Boston, Boston Police Department (BPD), the Boston Municipal Courts, the Trial Court of Massachusetts and the Department of Mental Health to provide criminal justice diversion programs designed to provide evaluation and treatment services to individuals with behavioral health problems with the goals of diverting arrests, minimizing incarceration and fostering recovery. These programs include a Police Co-responder Program, Mental Health Court Program and Outpatient Assisted Treatment Program. Through additional support in FY’21 from the City of Boston and federal grants, these programs are being significantly expanded.

The partnership provides a longitudinal collaboration with short and long term goals of changing attitudes, behaviors, and outcomes for citizens of Boston, Boston Police and the criminal justice system through  a variety of training and educational opportunities to joint program staff, Boston Police, fellows, community at-large.

BEST Partnership Multicultural Training and Education Initiatives:

  • Mental Health and Psychological First Aid for all
  • Anti-Racist and Implicit Bias Training- longitudinal engagement
  • Case-based Truth and Reconciliation Program- longitudinal learning
  • Crisis intervention training
  • De-escalation training
  • Fellowship in Behavioral Health, Racial and Social Justice

    BEST Partnership Data Coordinating Center:

    The BEST Partnership for Behavioral Health, Racial, and Social Justice Data Coordinating Center (DCC) offers the necessary resources to house a centralized database linking data from BPD, the Massachusetts Trial Courts, BEST, and the Boston Outpatient Assisted Treatment (BOAT) Program. Our team is comprised of Research Faculty, a research manager and coordinator, data analysts, and research and clinical postdoctoral fellows. Working with program leaders, the DCC team assists in the integration of program services and strengthens partnerships.

    Measurable Outcomes:

    • Reduction in police arrests
    • Reduction in ED visits
    • Reduction in duration of psychiatric hospitalizations
    • Change in police attitudes
    • Implicit Bias trainings for police, court, and behavioral health workforce
    • Decrease in unemployment rates among those with mental health disorders
    • Improve timely access to high quality behavioral health services

    Publications:

    Oblath, R., Herrera, C.N., Were, L.P.O. et al. Long-Term Trends in Psychiatric Emergency Services Delivered by the Boston Emergency Services Team. Community Ment Health J (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10597-022-01015-8

    Duncan, A., Herrera, C. N., Okobi, M., Nandi, S., & Oblath, R. (2022). Locked down or locked out? Trends in psychiatric emergency services utilization during the COVID-19 pandemic. Journal of Health Services Research & Policy, 28(2), 80-88

    Oblath, R., Oh, A., Herrera, C.N., Duncan, A., & Zhen-Duan, J. (2023). Psychiatric Emergencies among Urban Youth during COVID-19: Volume and Acuity in a Multi-Channel Program for the Publicly Insured. Journal of Psychiatric Research, 160, 71-77

    Herrera, C. N., Oblath, R., & Duncan, A. (2023). Psychiatric Boarding Patterns Among Publicly Insured Youths Evaluated by Mobile Crisis Teams Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic. JAMA Network Open, 6(7), e2321798-e2321798

     

    Conference Presentations and Posters:

    Oblath, R., Oh, A., Herrera, C., Duncan, A., & Zhen-Duan, J. (2022, May). Sociodemographic and clinical patterns in youth psychiatric emergency services utilization during the COVID-19 pandemic. Poster presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Psychiatric Association, New Orleans, LA.

    Okobi, M., Oblath, R., Nandi, S., & Duncan, A. (2022, May). COVID-19 associated with increased psychiatric emergency service use by patients with high utilization. Poster presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Psychiatric Association, virtual meeting.

    Oblath, R., Herrera, C., Duncan, A. (2022, November). Long-term trends in a Boston area alternative psychiatry emergency services program. In Lawless, J.W. (moderator) When a Difference Becomes a Disparity: Addressing Racialized Inequities in Psychiatric Emergency Treatment. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Public Health Association, Boston, MA.

    Herrera C., Oblath, R., Okobi, M., Nandi, S., & Duncan, A. (2022, June). Boarding as a Band-AidTM: Emergency stabilization substitute for standard of care during the pandemic. Poster presented at the Annual Research Meeting of AcademyHealth, Washington, D.C.

    Oblath, R., Herrera, C., & Duncan, A. (2022, November). Long-term trends in a Boston area alternative psychiatry emergency services program. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Public Health Association, Boston, MA.

    Herrera, C.N., Syed, S., Freibott, C., Duncan, A., & Clark, J. (2022, November). Shared decision making among youth of color, guardians, and care team during psychiatric emergency services visit. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Public Health Association, Boston, MA.

    Herrera, C.N., Syed, S., Freibott, C., Duncan, A., & Clark, J. (2022, November). LB+ youth of color perceptions of sexual orientation and gender identity discrimination in mental health settings. Poster presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Public Health Association, Boston, MA.

    Velez, G., Virani, N., Chava, A., Perez, D.C., Oblath, R., Camacho, L., Roque, K., & Wenzel, S. (2023, May) Influence of implicit racial biases on mental health outcomes reported by the Boston Emergency Services Team (BEST). Poster to be presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Psychiatric Association, San Francisco.

    Oblath, R., Herrera C.N., Xu, C., Syed, S., Henderson, D.C., & Duncan, A. (2023, May). Racial and Ethnic Differences in Pathways to Care, Diagnosis, and Disposition among Youth at a Multi-Modality Psychiatric Emergency Services Program. Poster presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Psychiatric Association, San Francisco, CA.

    Oblath, R., Xu, C., Herrera, C.N., Henderson, D.C., & Duncan, A. (2023, May). Differences or disparities: Racial patterns in public psychiatric emergency services. In Clarke, D. (chair) When a Difference Becomes a Disparity: Addressing Racialized Inequities in Psychiatric Emergency Treatment. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Psychiatric Association, San Francisco, CA.

    Black-Ingersoll, F., Burrows, K., Grady, S., Teigen, K., Oblath, R., Nori-Sarma, A. (2023, August). Assessing impacts of highly-spatially resolved environmental exposures using electronic health records of understudied populations. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the International Society of Exposure Science, Chicago, IL.

    Oblath, R., Xu, C., Herrera, C.N., Henderson D.C., & Duncan, A. (2023, November). The school to psychiatric emergency services pipeline: Racial and ethnic differences. In TBD (moderator) Challenges and Solutions to Stigma and Discrimination Experienced by Vulnerable Youth. Paper to be presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Public Health Association, Atlanta, GA.

    Khan, S., Beaugard, C.A., Carlin, C., Katkhuda, F., Oblath, R. (2023, December). Substance use and disposition plans for adults with psychosis utilizing psychiatric emergency services. Poster to be presented at the American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry, San Diego, CA.

     

    Other Publications: 

    Oblath, R., Ferguson, T., Herrera, C.N., & Borba, C.P. (2021). Preliminary Report: Boston Emergency Services Team (BEST) Mobile Team Encounters, 2018-2020. Report for the Mayor’s Office, Boston MA: Boston Medical Center.

    Herrera CN. Becoming a candidate for mental health care: a mixed methods investigation of how the process of seeking care contributes to persistent mental health disparities experienced by youth of color. Doctoral Thesis. Published online 2023.

     

    Media: 

    Youth with public insurance likely to be boarded during COVID”. Herrera C interviewed by Valerie A. Canady, Mental Health Weekly, July 31, 2023. Accessed at https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/mhw.33733

    “US had ‘psychiatric boarding crisis’ during COVID-19 pandemic.” Weldon R. Healio. July 7 2023. Accessed at https://www.healio.com/news/pediatrics/20230707/us-had-psychiatric-boarding-crisis-during-covid19-pandemic