Mental health and addictions care centre gets $81K grant

Hotel-dieu Grace Healthcare and the Canadian Mental Health Association have received $81,200 to support people struggling with addiction and mental health issues during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The grant comes from the Foundation for Advancing Family Medicine and the Canadian Mental Health Association Foundation.

It will be used to fund a registered nurse at the local CMHA branch’s Mental Health and Addictions Urgent Care Centre. The money will also be used to help with continued evaluation of the centre.

“Not only has access been improved to primary care with the introduction of the CMHA Health Centre, we are also noticing improving access to ongoing primary care, meaning individuals are coming back,” said Dr. Mohammed Hussain, the principal investigator for the grant and a primary care physician with CMHA Health Centre. “This is something not always experienced by our mental health patient population and a very positive strength of the program.”

The urgent care centre was initiated during the pandemic for people who can’t wait for community supports and are at a high risk of being hospitalized or ending up in the emergency department.

The centre’s team includes psychiatrists, registered nurses, primary care physicians, social workers and addictions specialists.

Services at the urgent care centre are scheduled to continue until October. But the hope is that longterm funding can be secured.

The centre opened in April. By July 30, 268 people had used its services. More than 100 of those people said they would have gone to the emergency department if the centre didn’t exist.

For more on the Mental Health and Addictions Urgent Care Centre, go to hdgh.org/mhaucc.