Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare sets service priorities for children and youth

The board of Hôtel-Dieu Grace Health Care (HDGH) has agreed on a set of priorities to tackle over the next three years in order to improve mental health services for children and youth.

According to Mary Broga, executive director for Lead Agency for Child and Youth Mental Health, they're looking at where there might be overlap or gaps.

Here are the priorities:

• Creating a centralized system where families can go to find out the services they need
• Helping homeless youth get access to mental health care
• Helping children with challenging behavioural issues, such as developmental disabilities and severe acting out
• Strengthening connection with primary care

Broga said more children and youth are seeking help for mental health issues and addictions — which she attributes to the result of better awareness.

"Kids are more aware of mental health issues. They're more willing to go out and seek help. We're actually losing the stigma that's associated with mental health," said Broga.

HDGH is also continuing to build services at the Transitional Stability Centre on Ouellette Avenue. HDGH CEO Janice Kaffer said about one third of the people coming into the centre are under 29.

"We are seeing that as an access point for youth as well," said Kaffer.

Kaffer said they are continuing to work on relocating 60 acute mental health care beds to the Tayfour Campus as part of the mega-hospital restructuring plan.

"We've actually added to that conversation the need for an urgent assessment centre or psychiatric emergency department here," said Kaffer.

According to Kaffer, such a centre would speed up services to the mentally ill, who currently "languish" for a long time at traditional emergency departments.

Kaffer said the new provincial government continues to familiarize itself with the structuring plan, but that the change in government hasn't delayed the project significantly. She said they continue to meet with the province.

"The election probably did kind of set us back a little bit because there was a period of time where government wasn't actually reviewing the file, but that would be normal," said Kaffer.

"Those kinds of delays were anticipated."