A Healthy Debate Improves Partnerships
Healthy Debate: Eliminating Stigma. Improving Partnerships.
A St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton initiative to help decriminalize mental illness, eliminate stigma and improve partnerships was profiled on Healthy Debate, a highly regarded digital publication that aims to help improve health care quality in Ontario by informing the public.
Jodi Younger, Director, Mental Health and Addiction Services is featured within the blog post entitled Improving hand offs between police and emergency departments.
In July 2013, St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton collaborated to launch a project with Hamilton Police Services in the form of a protocol that aims to safely and effectively decrease the amount of time officers spend accompanying someone in a mental health crisis once they have arrived to our Emergency Department. The protocol includes a collaborative process where police and health care professionals assess the patient’s behavior and history together.
In December 2013, The Hamilton Spectator reported that since launching, the protocol not only reduced the average wait time for officers to 81 minutes from 122 minutes, it also aided in reducing the stigma often associated with mental illness. These findings were then included in a report released last April by the Ontario Provincial Human Services and Justice Coordinating Committee.
This is just one way St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton has committed to reimagining care with the goal of reducing the stigma associated with mental illness. Looking ahead, St. Joseph’s continues to build new opportunities to improve community partnerships with this goal in mind.