Mental health service provider The Pennyroyal Center has linked its phone lines to a national crisis number. People in the Pennyroyal Center’s eight-county service region who call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline number will route back to the local agency's RESPOND call center. Quality Management Director Jamie Nichols says Louisville used to be the closest national crisis line link.
“Our staff are knowledgeable about what resources are available in the region, and we can be more helpful in trying to link them to those resources," said Nichols. "If they called a center that was in Louisville or they got linked to somewhere else per se, they would not know what was available to the people in our region.”
Nichols says membership in the Lifeline network doesn’t change the staff’s day-to-day operations. But she says it provides extra services, like information for veterans, crisis response through text messaging and increased access to grants. She hopes they will also soon begin offering crisis chat services through Lifeline too.
The Pennyroyal Center answered more than 4,000 crisis calls last year. Nichols says membership in the Lifeline network reflects a level of excellence at the Pennyroyal Center, because all local call centers must meet national standards to be included.
The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline number is 1-800-273-TALK (8255).
