Assessing the Impact of Arrest Status on Emergency Psychiatric Care

Little is known about individuals who require emergency psychiatric care immediately after arrest. The authors aimed to broadly describe this population compared with people receiving emergency psychiatric care who were not newly arrested (the comparison group).

In this large retrospective cohort study, the authors used emergency psychiatric evaluation records (N=82,417) from the New York City public hospital system between January 1, 2021, through September 30, 2022. The cohort was split into two groups by arrest status. Age, race-ethnicity, gender, primary diagnosis, length of stay in the psychiatric emergency department (PED), and disposition were compared between the two groups with descriptive statistics and regression models.

Overall, 7.9% of PED evaluations were conducted with newly arrested patients. This group was more likely to be younger, Black, or male compared with the patients in the comparison group and was significantly less likely to be diagnosed as having a psychiatric disorder, including serious mental illness and substance use disorders. Newly arrested patients had a slightly but statistically significantly shorter length of stay in the PED than those in the comparison group. However, newly arrested patients with a schizophrenia spectrum diagnosis or serious mental illness had significantly longer lengths of stay.

Newly arrested patients examined in PEDs may have different diagnoses and psychiatric evaluation procedures compared with patients who had not been arrested. This finding may be due to the influence of criminal legal involvement on clinical presentation and provider evaluation. More research is needed to identify potential inequities in care, especially for those with serious mental illnesses.