Product Spotlight: Crisis Notifications—Linking Behavioral Health Crises With Care

Behavioral health crises continue to be on the rise.

Recent data indicates that nearly 60 million adults (23.08%) in the U.S. experienced a mental illness in the past year, with almost 13 million adults (5.04%) reporting serious thoughts of suicide. Additionally, more than 45 million adults (17.82%) are experiencing substance use challenges.

Even more concerning, the majority of individuals struggling with substance use in the U.S. are not receiving treatment. Of those 45 million adults, 77% did not receive treatment.

For individuals experiencing mental health or substance use crises, timely intervention can be the difference between a cycle of relapse, placing pressure on our health and public safety systems, or a pathway to recovery.

At Ascend, we leverage data and technology to enhance programs and service delivery. Crisis Notifications is one of our longest-running products. It is designed to close the gap by providing real-time alerts that help community-based response teams connect with individuals who need support—especially those not currently connected to care.

What are Crisis Notifications?

Crisis Notifications is a real-time notification system that alerts treatment providers and community response teams securely when individuals are admitted to hospital emergency departments with behavioral health or substance use-related crisis diagnoses. The system creates opportunities for outreach to reduce the likelihood that someone falls through the cracks as they transition from one care setting to another.

Our team establishes the technology infrastructure and collaborates with community partners to create the network of agreements and processes needed for coordinated care while ensuring adherence to healthcare privacy laws (HIPAA).

How Does It Work?

1. Hospital Data Integration: Ascend collaborates with hospitals to receive secure, real-time data through CliniSync, Ohio's Health Information Exchange (HIE), an infrastructure that allows healthcare providers to share relevant health information.
2. Notification Prompt: When a patient is admitted for a behavioral health or substance use crisis, the system identifies relevant medical details, such as diagnosis codes, and checks for an existing connection with a treatment provider.
3. Coordinated Community Alerts: Ascend determines active connections to treatment services based on access to other data-sharing relationships with community partners and providers. If the patient has an active treatment relationship, the system sends an email alert to the provider of record with a link to the secure notification. If the patient does not have an active treatment relationship, the alert goes to the community crisis response team.
4. Connection to Care: Trained professionals follow up with the patient and offer resources, referrals, and support to engage the individual in treatment services if desired.
5. Feedback: Each notification includes a survey to track what happened during the outreach—whether the person was contacted and what kind of support they received.

The Impact: Reaching Those Without Established Care

Connecting individuals who do not currently have an active relationship with a treatment provider is the key differentiator of Crisis Notifications. By alerting community response teams when an individual without a treatment connection has a crisis event, the system creates an opportunity for proactive outreach—before they slip through the cracks—which improves outcomes.

A 2024 study conducted by Ascend demonstrated that engagement with Public Health - Dayton & Montgomery County's Recovery Outreach Team, a user of the real-time system, led to significant improvements in post-crisis outcomes, including:

• Reduced hospital utilization and total charges—fewer emergency visits and reduced charges billed to insurance providers, including Medicaid
• Fewer interactions with law enforcement—fewer unnecessary arrests or emergency detentions
• Reduced death rate—lower risk of fatal outcomes related to overdose and other behavioral health crises

Expanding Crisis Notifications

Ascend is working toward modifying the core functionality of Crisis Notifications to apply to other critical areas in the community, including:

• Probate Notification System: This past week, a new installation went live that allows the Probate Court to be notified if an individual on their civil commitment docket admits to an emergency department with a mental health crisis. This helps the Probate team ensure quicker responses to coordinate care for that individual.
• Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) & Pink Slip Implementations: Ascend is also developing two additional applications that modify Crisis Notifications to alert on other crisis events. Instead of hospital admissions, the notifications will be driven by emergency hospitalizations (pink slips) initiated by law enforcement and interactions with a CIT team. Both applications ensure that providers working with the individual have more visibility and opportunity for outreach.

Looking Ahead

In 2025, Ascend is expanding the Crisis Notifications system to new Ohio communities, including Union County and the Muskingum County Area. Once those implementations are complete, the system will be live in 14 counties.

By connecting data across the behavioral health continuum of care, we're not just aiming to improve outcomes. We're working hard to reinforce the safety net for those who need it most.

Interested in learning more about Crisis Notifications or bringing them to your community? Contact us today at [email protected] or reach out to Josh Gratsch to explore how data-driven solutions can enhance your crisis response efforts!

Stay tuned—next month, we'll provide an update on the Safety Net Portal, a new product we're developing over the next 15 months that will take this concept to the next level.

Ascend Innovations is a mission-driven data and technology company focused on improving behavioral health and crisis response outcomes. We specialize in aligning relationships, data, and technology to help communities enhance the impact of programs and services.

Our solutions bridge critical information gaps between health systems, behavioral health providers, public health agencies, and law enforcement. By leveraging real-time data and user-centered technology, we enhance care coordination, reduce system inefficiencies, and improve outcomes for individuals in crisis.

With a strong foundation in relationship-driven innovation, Ascend collaborates with state and local organizations to implement scalable, sustainable solutions that have a measurable impact on communities across Ohio.