Crisis Services’ 24-Hour Suicide Prevention and Crisis Counseling Program has been a staple in the Erie County and WNY area for over 50 years with several hotlines that provide 24-hour, 7-days-a-week support to anyone calling into the agency.
The Crisis Counseling 24-Hour Hotline Program provides immediate response to all callers and serves approximately 100,000 callers a year seeking assistance during or after a crisis, a traumatic event, or just needing to have someone provide them validation and hope.
When you call Crisis Services you will always speak with a trained professional counselor or paraprofessional volunteer. Our hotline phone counselors are dedicated to providing the best support to every caller and are trained to provide evidence-based lethality assessment and interventions, to screen and assess the individual’s level of risk to then determine the best level of support needed to maintain and ensure the caller’s safety.
The Crisis Counseling Hotline Program provides crisis counseling, suicide prevention, support, information, and referral. We triage each call in order of emergency so please be patient and stay on the line, your call is very important to us.
In addition to providing immediate access to all Crisis Services Programs including our Mobile Outreach and Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence Advocate Programs, the Crisis Counseling Hotline Program also provides the following specialty lines:
Founded in 2016 and funded by Erie County, our Addictions Hotline can provide you with options finding the appropriate level of treatment that is best for you in your time of need. If you are in search of detox, inpatient, or outpatient, you or your loved one will receive help any time, any day. The hotline delivers immediate engagement, information, and referral services to substance abuse treatment agencies for Erie County residents.
This dedicated hotline provides support for school-age children, adolescents, parents, and educators immediately and confidentially, 24 hours a day.
Crisis Services contracts with Chautauqua County to provide immediate crisis intervention, supportive counseling, information, and referrals to those who call. Our professionals will also connect with services if immediate on-site intervention if needed.
Provides 24-hour support within Erie and close surrounding counties. NSPL is a nationwide network of over 140 crisis centers. If you need to connect to a crisis center outside of the Erie County area, National Suicide Prevention Lifeline can assist you with connecting you to your local crisis center.
The 24-Hour Crisis Counseling Program is the designated agency to assist as the Mental Health Continuum of care for specified mental health clinics in Erie County from 4:00pm to 9:00am during a regular week, and on weekends and holidays, when their clinics are closed. The calls are forwarded to our Crisis Hotline for clients to receive support, or assistance during a crisis.
When calling Crisis Services 24-Hour Hotline, you will receive an automated menu of options to choose from to direct your call efficiently to the right program service. Below are the options available to direct your call to a specialized hotline counselor to assist you:
The 24-hour Suicide Prevention and Crisis Counseling Hotline Counselors are trained to administer a short phone version of the Columbia Suicide Severity Rating Scale (C-SSRS) and the American Association of Suicidology Intervention Model to all callers that are calling the hotline for services to determine appropriate levels of intervention.
Your safety and privacy is our number one priority.
When you call Crisis Services you will always speak to a live Phone Counselor who is trained in crisis intervention, suicide prevention, lethality assessments, supportive counseling, and can provide on-the-spot information and referrals to assist you any time of the day.
The information that you provide to the Phone Counselor when you call the agency is kept confidential and only released (according to HIPPA regulations) in the event that you are actively suicidal, state that you are going to harm yourself or someone else, or if when you call Crisis Services in the middle of a medical crisis and need emergency assistance to keep you safe.
Crisis Services adheres to all AAS and HIPPA guidelines and will not release any of your confidential information unless you are actively suicidal, state that you are going to harm yourself or someone else, have given consent that we could give out your information (written consent is most referred), or if when you call Crisis Services in the middle of a medical crisis and need emergency assistance to keep you safe.
Depending on the current situation, there are many different next steps that can be taken all in the efforts to best assist you and to ensure your safety. Whether it be information and referral, emotional or continuous support, or a referral to one of our other programs. The Crisis Services mission is to make sure that we ask the appropriate questions to arrive at a decision to keep you safe.
A crisis doesn’t schedule an appointment. So, Crisis Services is here for you 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Our team of trained counselors and volunteers are dedicated to providing educated, individualized support to each individual who calls to ensure proper support all while keeping the caller’s safety as the top priority.
