The May Court Club of Chatham has donated $8,000 to the Foundation of Chatham-Kent Health Alliance (CKHA) in support of Chatham-Kent ACCESS Open Minds (ACCESS).
ACCESS stands for Adolescent/young adult Connections to Community-driven, Early, Strengths-based and Stigma-free services. It is the first pan-Canadian research network funded under Canadian Institute of Health Research’s Strategy for Patient-Oriented Research and is jointly funded by the Canadian Institutes for Health Research and the Graham Boeckh Foundation.
A goal of ACCESS is to develop an evidence-informed, sustainable and scalable model for mental health service delivery that positively impacts youth mental health outcomes in Canada. This goal will be achieved by developing, implementing and evaluating an innovative transformation of the way in which mental health services are accessed by and delivered to youth. ACCESS’s youth mental health services transformation is being implemented and evaluated at 12 sites in six provinces and one territory. Chatham-Kent is the only community in Ontario involved in this initiative.
A Monday, May 9 launch is scheduled for the official start to the operations of Chatham-Kent ACCESS Open Minds. This will result in a collection of adolescent/young adult (A/YA) services working within one site, in a collaborative, interagency model, aimed to reduce the frustration that A/YA and their families experience when they are trying to access mental health and addictions services. It will provide one number for Chatham Kent residents and their families to access for any adolescent/young adult mental health and addictions and related services.
