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Saving lives are crisis responders’ passion

BY ASHLYN ROBINETTE

Tribune Staff Writer

Every moment across the region, tireless mental health professionals answer calls for help from people of all ages who are experiencing a mental health crisis.

Terros Health's team of frontline heroes meet these individuals wherever they are to provide assessment, intervention and connection to ongoing care resources.

For Mesa resident Molly Fisher-Foster, saving these lives is its own reward.

“The reward comes from within,” she said. “There are days where I go home and know that I was able to make a positive difference in someone’s life.”

Fisher-Foster has been at the center of delivering mobile crisis services for Terros Health for more than 23 years, addressing mental health emergencies involving suicidal thoughts, self-harm, potential harm to others, trauma, loss, substance abuse, Mesa resident Milly Fisher-Foster is a mobile crisis service provider for Terros Health.

(Pablo Robles/Tribune Sta Photographer) increased depression or anxiety, and more. Once dispatched, Fisher-Foster works with a partner to stabilize individuals in crisis and provide mental health services to them no matter their location or situation. “Every day is different,” she said. “When you think you’ve seen everything you haven’t because there’s another day.”

Fisher-Foster recalled how once an elderly woman with physical and mental health conditions walked out of a skilled nursing facility in Massachusetts and boarded a bus for Arizona.

The woman, who had feeding tubes, was unable to take her medications or had had no food or water for four days. After receiving the call, Fisher-Foster was able to meet her and get her the help she needed.

It’s a taxing job, but one that reaps big rewards when there’s an opportunity to change someone’s life, she said.

She compares situations like these to solving a puzzle, putting all of the pieces together to help people become whole again.

Fisher-Foster especially does well with

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Mesa congregation opens heart to needy families

BY SYDNEY MACKIE Tribune Staff Writer

In lieu of their annual mission trip, members of the First Presbyterian Church of Mesa last month dedicated themselves to providing essentials to 10 families in the Valley facing �inancial and personal dif�iculties.

To complete this project, which the group called “Mission: Possible,” the church connected with the organization CarePortal, a database of requests submitted by caseworkers at government child welfare agencies or other child-serving organizations.

Local churches are then encouraged to utilize their means and membership to aid and donate the requested items to these families.

“All of these families have had children that are in the system,” said Ellen Hickey, Members of the First Presbyterian Church of Mesa helped 10 families in crisis by providing them with necessary household and personal items the families could not a ord. Now, they’re going to adopt a family a month to repeat their charitable outreach. (Special to the Tribune) been keeping watch or they’ve actually been taken away or returned.”

Hickey has been a member of the congregation since 1976 when her mother found the First Presbyterian Church of Mesa shortly after moving here from Holland.

Since then, Hickey has taken an active role in organizing the church’s variety of charity projects.

These include the mission trips to the Navajo Reservations and Mexico, which were canceled this year due to COVID-19 and other programs like the food pantry and annual assistance for homeless women. “This portal kept talking to me. I’ve been hearing about it for years and it just kept reaching out to me, it got to where I couldn’t ignore the pull, the holler and the yes, I hear you telling me I need to do this. ���MISSION ���� 20

grief calls, she said.

“People who are suffering and in crisis or in grief will always remember what you said to them, how you treated them and how they felt when you left,” she said.

Fisher-Foster emphasized the importance of being present and unafraid.

Listening to people and providing compassion and companionship is key. She has stayed with individuals as their loved ones passed, joined in prayer circles and attended funeral services.

“It’s important when we can leave knowing we’ve provided some comfort and help to someone,” she said.

It is the work of frontline heroes like Fisher-Foster that has contributed to the success of mobile crisis response in Arizona.

Thanks to their work - as well as continuous system improvements, extensive training and collaboration - Arizona and Maricopa County have become gold standards in mobile crisis response.

“We have the largest, most supported and well-funded crisis system in the country,” said Justin Chase, president and CEO of Solari Inc.

Trained clinicians answer calls to stabilize and resolve challenges that indi-

MISSION ���� ���� 19

So I reached out,” Hickey recalled.

By July 7, the congregation had been matched with the 10 Valley families that required their assistance. Many were located in Central Phoenix, an area where households’ needs often get overlooked, according to Hickey.

“There are these other areas of Arizona that aren’t getting covered and you keep seeing them popping up on your screen. Sometimes they’re just simple little needs, but the churches in the neighborhoods don’t have the �inancial ability to help everyone,” Hickey said. Soon, the 251 members of the First Presbyterian Church of Mesa leaped into action, sorting themselves into three teams of prayer, donation and delivery. Over the next �ive days, they would collect cribs, bunk beds, car seats and high chairs among other items with help of the community and local resources.

Shelly Cronenberg, a mission elder at the church, recounted the requests of two of the families assisted through the mission. viduals face, but in the event that they are not able to stabilize the situation over the phone mobile crisis teams are dispatched.

Maricopa County’s community stabilization rate – the benchmark for keeping mobile crisis patients out of the hospital – now stands at 80 percent compared with a national guideline of 70 percent. About 2000 mobile crisis teams are dispatched per month throughout the Valley with an average response time of fewer than 30 minutes, said Pat Norris, clinical manager of Terros Health.

An 80 percent stabilization rate essentially means that 1,600 people don’t go to the hospital every month. This takes pressure off inpatient facilities by diverting people who don’t need to be there.

One reason Maricopa County’s mobile crisis system is so successful is their two-clinician team model, Chase said. Other models like the co-responder model where a police of�icer goes out with a clinician have a stabilization rate below 50%.

“There’s a difference when you bring a gun and a uniform to a scene,” Chase said. “There’s a power dynamic there so the success rate is less.”

Other crisis systems may be left with their last resort of dispatching law enforcement, which is not in the best interest of the individual or a safe environment, Chase said. Those in crisis may end up in emergency departments or facility-based care that have lower success rates.

This experience can also be demoralizing or dehumanizing for the individual as critical compassion is lacking.

“Our teams are independent,” said David Obergfell, senior director of crisis services at Terros Health. “We partner with �irst response upon request and as part of the system of care but we are an independent unit that can respond anywhere without law enforcement to deliver psychiatric assessment, health intervention, connections to care and onsite stabilization support.”

Obergfell said their two-person mobile response teams are not pressure-bound or time-bound, so they can stay as long as needed to understand the nature of the crisis, listen and de-escalate the situation.

They assess the individual’s needs to see what services can be applied at the right time and partner with them to change how things are operating in their current environment for better long term outcomes.

“Trust is critical to establish a connection with the person you’re working with,” Obergfell said. “We build rapport and trust

Members of the First Presbyterian Church of Mesa will now pick a needy family every

month to help. (Special to the Tribune)

The �irst was a father attempting to reunify with his teenage daughter while �ixing a house for his other four children to reside in. He needed �ive air mattresses and a microwave, which the church was able to provide alongside sheets, microwavable treats, a gift card for groceries and a soc-

THE MESA TRIBUNE | AUGUST 1. 2021 by introducing ourselves and listening. It’s not rigid, it’s not a checklist.”

“They can drop their guard and feel safe sharing information.”

Another important aspect of mobile crisis success is following up with individuals. “A crisis episode isn’t just the time we come out,” Obergfell said. “There’s a next day.”

Terros Health follows up the next day with the people they helped to see how they are, remind them that they are not alone, and provide any additional care to prevent another crisis from happening, Obergfell said.

“We’re not just here to save you, but we’re going to partner with you,” Obergfell said. “We don’t save people, we join people in recovery.”

Terros Health and Solari have taken steps to strengthen partnerships with law enforcement, schools, �irst responders and municipalities; develop a cuttingedge clinical model that guides response in the �ield; and create a state-of-the-art disaster response program in the event of shootings, �ires, school incidents and other critical events, Obergfell said.

In a crisis? Call 1-800-631-1314 for

help ■

cer ball for the kids.

The second was a teenage girl who had recently lost her mother and had been transferred to the care and home of her grandmother.

She needed clothes and because her grandmother had a limited income, the church stepped in to get many stylish clothes in her size donated, as well as a Target gift card for shoes.

“I think you had a lot of people who were really very grateful, very grateful,” Cronenberg said.

Moving forward, the church made it a priority to help one family per month with their necessities and requests.

Members also plan to complete a bunk bed build soon, creating this home essential from scratch for locals who require them.

“When I walked into the church’s youth room and saw it full of donations, it really warmed my heart that people all came together and did this,” Cronenberg described, “It was cool to see every aspect like the donations, the overwhelming generosity that was given and how it impacted the families.” ■