Ohio has expanded youth mental health services with the expansion of its Mobile Response and Stabilization Services, now operating in all 88 counties.
This week, Gov. Mike DeWine announced the expansion of the initiative that sends teams of trained medical and mental healthcare professionals to youth in crisis.
“This is so very, very important for so long,” he said. “I’ve heard families talk about the fact that if there’s a mental health crisis in their family with one of their children, they don’t really know where to go. They don’t know what to do. This will solve that problem.”
The visits are triggered by callers to the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline who request the service.
Those callers could include parents, educators, medical professionals, law enforcement officers, or youth in crisis.
Health care teams should arrive within 60 minutes of the call.
The Ohio Department of Behavioral Health and the Ohio Department of Medicaid have been working together since April on the expanded MRSS program.
The agencies have selected 12 health care providers to serve the state’s 88 counties.
Local options
Butler Behavioral Health provides these services in Butler, Clinton, Hamilton, and Warren counties.
The organization’s President & CEO, Randy Allman, calls the program “comprehensive” and emphasizes its importance as a preventative measure for keeping youth out of other systems, like the juvenile justice system.
“If we can prevent crisis from happening in the school, then we can prevent unnecessary disciplinary actions.” Allman said. “We can prevent potentially, system involvements such as foster care, juvenile justice. We believe that they will thrive because of those preventative things that we were able to do with the MRSS service.”
Preventing kids from entering into those intervening systems continues through the OhioRISE, which is Ohio’s specialized program for youth with complex needs.
Once the crisis team has made a requested visit, they are evaluated to see if additional behavioral supports through OhioRISE.
Measuring impact
Program operators say this can further reduce youth interactions with law enforcement, criminal justice, and hospital emergency departments.
DeWine’s office said the program is already having an impact, reporting that between July 1, 2024, and June 30, 2025, there were 10,249 calls to MRSS.
Of those, suicidality (41%) was the primary reason for referral with family conflict/stress
(27%) the second highest reason for referral.
Of the youth who received the ongoing stabilization services:
99.7% had no new admissions to a residential treatment center.99.1% had no new admissions to a crisis stabilization unit.99% had no new admissions to a jail/detention center.98.2% had no caregiver/school calls to police to address behaviors.