Mental health is an important part of our overall health, but many people confront barriers that keep them from accessing the mental health care they need.

A program in Boston aims to  address mental health disparities by disrupting traditional health care models. The Boston Emergency Services Team, or BEST, is led by Dr. David Henderson, chief of psychiatry at Boston Medical Center. 

BEST brings together mental health providers, community resources, law enforcement, and the judicial system to deliver care to people in need of mental health services.

Henderson says bringing mental health providers alongside police responding to calls for service for mental health needs has helped reduce the number of people with mental illness ending up in jails and prisons.

“The criminal justice system has, by default, become one of the largest mental health systems … around the country as well,” Henderson says. “People with mental illness are in jails and prisons, at a percentage that they really should not be.”

Henderson speaks with Health Disparities podcast host Hadiya Green about what it takes to ensure people in need of mental health services get the help they need, why it’s important to train providers to recognize unconscious biases, and what it means to provide trauma-informed and culturally sensitive care.