Evans Rochaste is a board-certified psychiatric nurse practitioner and the founder and CEO of ReKlame Health. He witnessed the stark differences in the care available at New York’s hospitals when he was a psychiatric nurse at Northwell, Bronx Lebanon, and New York Presbyterian-Columbia. He also experienced the frustration of trying to get mental health services as a young Black man growing up in Brooklyn - stigma from loved ones to all services being out-of-network and costly and lack of Black male mental health providers for him to confide in. This experience inspired Evans to drive change in the behavioral health care system and to remove the stigma commonly associated with seeking mental health care while improving people’s lives through a holistic approach to medical treatment.
Fixing the mental health crisis is a long journey, but the first step is addressing the lack of resources and affordable access available to BIPOC and underserved communities, as well as the long-term implications that lack of services have on those patients.