ECHINOPS team: Mental health workers & police join forces in St-Michel & St-Leonard

Mental health workers and community organizations are answering mental health related calls with police officers as part of a new pilot project in Saint-Michel and Saint-Leonard.

The new intervention team is called ECHINOPS, and includes police officers from stations 30 and 42 in Saint-Michel and Saint-Leonard, nurses and psychiatrists from the CLSC Saint-Michel, and community groups.

“About 80% of calls made to 911 when they specifically ask for the intervention of police are psychosocial situations that need to be tackled. A lot of them have mental health issues, so it’s important psychiatrists and mental health professionals, stand with police officers, to offer support and assessments in a timely manner, and allow these people to get inside the health care system. When we call police, it’s a matter of urgency. So we want to intervene quickly,” explains Dr.Luigi De Benedictis, psychiatrist with the CIUSSS de l’Est-de-l’Île-de-Montréal.

The team is called in as a follow up to ensure mental health services.

“After the police have interviewed and the person needs help, it comes to us and we follow up. Either the person needs the police’s help or they need something else and usually they do need the health care system’s help. We get together. We assess. We go over there. We as police officers get to see the person at home and how they live and what they need. We bring the doctor with us, which is amazing. We get to help the person for exactly what they need,” says Julie Mazerolle, socio police officer at station 42 in Saint-Leonard.

The project also aims to keep people out of already overcrowded emergency rooms.

“We try to avoid using the ER because when people are brought to the emergency room, it’s often under distress or they don’t want to be there. We want to bring them into the system in a way that’s not threatening to them. That’s why, we try to do part of the work at home. We try to assist them there. We try to explain how the health care system works, what type of services are available and bring them to the right professional,” adds Dr. De Benedictis.

Mental health care workers from CLSC Saint-Michel are working with the SPVM as part of this pilot project. Photo Credit: Martin Daigle/CityNews

ECHINOPS has been in service since January 2022. The results will be evaluated and then it will be decided whether the team stays on permanently. The hope is also to expand it to other communities. Both Officer Mazerolle and Dr. De Benedictis, say the results have been amazing.

“The problem that the police have is that we keep going to the same address for the same problem, and nothing gets done afterwards because the person needs to go to the ER or the clinic, and usually they don’t go for help. So the biggest result is getting the help the person needs. Instead of just letting them try to navigate the health care system by themselves, we bring the help to them,” says Officer Mazerolle.