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The National Suicide Prevention Hotline has changed to an easier three-digit number.
State Mental Health and Substance Abuse Commissioner Marie Williams said 9-8-8 is what Tennessee residents will now dial for mental health emergencies.
“It’s absolutely good news to me, and I hope it is good news to everybody out there that is in a crisis,” Williams said. “When you go from that number to 9-8-8, that’s going to be really easy to remember.”
Williams said before, the hotline was 855-CRISIS-1. Williams said last year, 158,000 individuals called the hotline. Williams said she hopes the new number will make the crisis network more accessible.
“Our hope is to continue giving that service we have been giving,” Williams said. “Number one making sure whoever calls gets to a professional who can assess and determine the best place for that person to get treated or another service. Our hope is that more people that might have needs call, so we can reduce suicide.”
Williams said the change has been in the works since 2019.
“One of the things that was discussed was trying to make sure that each state had a network in place, so dollars were given out in 2020 and 2021 to expand the network,” Williams said. “Fortunately, in our state we have a great amount of crisis availability, so we are not starting from scratch. We are building onto a robust system.”
