Translating research into practice: the implementation of an in-home crisis intervention triage and treatment service in the private sector.

This report focuses on the implementation and evaluation of a 24-hour-a-day, in-home crisis intervention, triage, and treatment service in a 110,000 member health maintenance organization. The in-home crisis intervention service averted the need for hospitalization in 80% of referred patients presenting for inpatient admission. A two-year analysis, involving more than 600 patients, found nearly four times fewer severe psychiatric relapses requiring readmission among patients triaged by the crisis intervention service, compared to patients hospitalized without going through its service. The service saved approximately 3,347 days of hospital-based psychiatric care over the two-year study period. This program evaluation data, combined with previous research, documents that for the vast majority of hospitalized psychiatric patients, intensive in-home crisis intervention and treatment services are a more effective and cost-efficient form of care.