The Criminal Justice & Mental Health Research Center (the Center) conducts independent and unbiased program evaluations and offers evaluation support services, to include designing evaluations before project implementation. Evaluations can be used to provide timely and critical information or decision making about a particular program. In particular, evaluation help establish the evidence base for a particular approach (i.e., intervention or policy) to produce desired outcomes, assess changes over time, and/or compare and contrast approaches in a scientific, synthesized manner.
In 2021-2022, the Center designed and implemented an evaluation of GRAND Mental Health’s (formerly Grand Lake Mental Health Center, a Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinic located in Oklahoma), innovative crisis prevention and response system. Findings from An Evaluation of the Grand Response Access Network on Demand Model (GRAND Model): Evidence of Effective Outcomes report showed that 1) inpatient hospitalizations among GRAND adult clients at any Oklahoma psychiatric hospital fell from 959 (2015) to 66 (2021) for a reduction of 93.1%, and 2) inpatient hospitalizations among GRAND adult client at Wagoner Hospital fell from 841 (2015) to 0 (2021) for a reduction of 100% (Figure 1).
Figure 1. Number of Grand Mental Health Adult Clients Who Went Inpatient to WagonerHospital, 2015 – 2021
