![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Screenshot-27-3.png?resize=594%2C327&ssl=1\")
<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\u201cBecause of their profession and because they don\u2019t want to be perceived as being weak or asking for help, they\u2019re afraid to ask somebody \u2018What do I do?\u2019 \u2018How do I get help or how can I continue on?\u2019\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pacheco has his own experience with mental health issues and suicide. He was away at a conference when his wife died by suicide 15 years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThis police department investigated her death and so all of my friends had to answer that call,\u201d said Pacheco. \u201cIt shocks you and it really changes your life and changes your perspective on life.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pacheco said it took conversations with empathetic coworkers to even recognize that he had gone through a traumatic event and to seek the help he needed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the years since, he has worked to make sure officers understand the impact the job has on their mental health.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe things that we see and the things we have to deal with in this job will change you as a human being,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He has worked with Lakeland Regional Health to provide an alternative, discreet entrance for officers seeking mental health treatment in a crisis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He meets with new recruits and their families to discuss warning signs of mental distress.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe ones that are closest to us are going to notice that change before anybody does,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In March, the Lakeland Police Department launched a customized version of the \u201cLighthouse Health & Wellness\u201d app on the work cell phones of sworn officers, civilian employees and retired officers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It consolidates all the mental health resources available to employees, including contact information for the peer support team, of which Asst. Chief Pacheco is a member.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201c24\/7 assistance so those are your hotlines, your suicide hotline. There\u2019s another entity called Cop Line which is actually manned by police officers or retired police officers,\u201d said Pacheco.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It also includes questionnaires about depression, anxiety and alcohol use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt will give you some recommendations that, hey you\u2019re feeling stressed, this is where your score\u2019s at so maybe you need to call a peer support person or maybe you need to reach out to a chaplain or call [Employee Assistance Program] EAP,\u201d Pacheco said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The app cost $3,300 for the department to be able to customize it and send targeted alerts to employees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The hope is to provide officers with a first step to seeking mental health treatment in a crisis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cLet\u2019s just say an officer or a civilian is going through a bad time in their life and they\u2019re feeling stressed out. They don\u2019t really know. They\u2019ve never been to a counselor. They\u2019ve never been to a psychologist. They don\u2019t really know where they\u2019re at in life,\u201d said Pacheco.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Lakeland Fire Department is also considering utilizing the app.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There is already a focus on mental health within that department, including its own peer support group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cYou need to vent sometimes with all the stresses, do it with someone who understands rather than take it home to your wife and kids,\u201d said Lt. Paramedic Phil Green, who coordinates the peer support group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the end, Pacheco says, the goal is to save lives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cA lot of our public safety professionals die by suicide because they don\u2019t feel like they can reach out and talk to somebody and get help,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Lakeland Assistant Police Chief Steve Pacheco has spent much of the last decade getting officers to talk about their feelings, their anxieties, and their mental health. \u201cBecause of their profession… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":32254,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"0","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":71799,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[12,14],"tags":[5049],"class_list":["post-32253","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local","category-news","tag-lakeland-police-utilize-app-to-help-officers-and-staff-with-mental-health-issues"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32253","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32253"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32253\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32254"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32253"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32253"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32253"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}