Recently, The Chronicle Herald published a story titled “Young people need more access to mental health services – volunteer.” While I agree with this message, we must also begin to think about how we can better provide mental health care, and not just keep applying a model of mental health services that does not appropriately meet the needs of young people and their families.

Just doing more of the same will not result in substantial improvements in the mental health of our youth, nor will it ensure that those who develop and are living with mental illness receive the best possible scientifically validated care in the most timely and respectful manner. We have to begin to think differently and act innovatively.

First, we must use the best available scientific evidence to create, deliver and evaluate all programs and interventions that are provided to young people and their families. Fortunately, there is increasing recognition of this necessity among policy makers, care providers and the public.

Unfortunately, many programs in place or being promoted either have not been appropriately demonstrated to be effective, or their effectiveness is not known. Worse, some programs are known not to be effective, yet continue in place.

Second, we must think of how to provide mental health care, rather than mental health services. Currently, youth and families frequently must attend specialty mental health providers to receive care that could be more appropriately, more efficiently and perhaps even more cost-effectively provided in primary health care settings.

It is essential that effective and evidence-based mental health care be available throughout Nova Scotia in all primary health care settings. This can be achieved by modifying the way in which primary health care is delivered and by enhancing the mental health competencies of all primary care providers.

Third, we must meet young people where they are – that is, in their families and in their institutions.

Young children are profoundly influenced by their family environments and there is substantial scientific evidence that supports the use of specific early life interventions on improving outcomes for youth. These interventions should be widely available.

Concurrently, we know that our young people spend most of their lives in one of two institutions – schools or jails. It is imperative that we keep them in schools and enhance the capacity of schools to meet their mental health needs in conjunction with providing the best learning enabling environments possible.

In Nova Scotia, a number of initiatives, supported by various government departments are beginning to address this need. These innovations need to be further developed so that all our young people can benefit, and those of us who assist them in their growth and development can be better assured that our efforts will be likely to succeed.

~ Dr. Stan Kutcher

Realted:
Facing mental illness: a 10-step plan for Nova Scotia

Tags: mental health, Policy

This entry was posted on Friday, March 20th, 2009 at 10:39 am and is filed under Health Care, Policy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.