Project Connect Evaluation: Exploring Youth Suicide Readmissions Post-Intervention​

Since 2022, The New Jersey Department of Children and Families’ (NJDCF) Children’s System of Care (CSOC) has been implementing Project Connect, a care coordination model that aims to improve access to mental health services for youth with suicidality following discharge from hospital emergency departments. Project Connect partners with hospitals around New Jersey to train hospital staff to recognize, assess, and manage suicide risk, and provides information on linking youth to services through the Children’s System of Care (CSOC) as well as tool kits for family-centered education. Currently, 29 hospitals in New Jersey are partnered with Project Connect. When youth arrive at a Project Connect-partnered hospital’s emergency department with suicidality, consenting families are linked with a CSOC Regional Care Coordinator (RCC) who assists the family with follow-up appointment scheduling, navigating barriers to care, and providing support and education around youth mental health. The RCC also helps facilitate a “warm hand-off” process to PerformCare (CSOC’s central contracted services administrator) which provides 24/7/365 care access. RCCs typically engage in anywhere from 1-6 calls with caregivers on average, lasting around 2-3 weeks post-discharge.  

NJDCF’s Office of Applied Research & Evaluation is implementing an evaluation of Project Connect. The aims of the evaluation are to determine if the Project Connect care coordination model improves (1) youth access to follow-up care, (2) caregivers’ knowledge of how to best support their children’s treatment and safety, and (3) reduces subsequent hospital or EMS encounters due to suicidality or other behavioral health crises. This proposed project, utilizing linked data through iPHD, will concentrate specifically on aim 3.