ABSTRACT
In July 2000, Oklahoma's downsizing of the Eastern State Hospital, causing the greatest single loss of bed capacity in Oklahoma, provided a window of opportunity for National Association of Mental Illness (NAMI)-Oklahoma to successfully employ various strategies in the policy formulation and definition stages to promote the Program of Assertive Community Treatment (PACT). The primary means for treating mental illness in Oklahoma prior to the state's decision to finance two PACT teams in 1999 was institutionalization in large state hospitals. Networking across state lines took place soon thereafter, allowing PACT specialists to share details and policy innovations with neighboring states. PACT became highly political because of the funding sources. One PACT team member familiar with state agencies explained how clinicians were actually taken from programs that had shut down to start state PACT teams after the two initial private teams had been funded.
