At the beginning of this year, we surveyed stakeholders across Ontario’s mental health and addictions system about what their most urgent needs are with respect to:
- areas of evidence for improving programs, services, and policies
- types of resources EENet can produce to help inform decision-making
- other knowledge mobilization services EENet can provide to help get the right evidence into the hands of the people who need it.
This is what we heard.
Evidence
The top three areas of evidence identified as most useful are:
Health equity and mental health in marginalized populations
Mental health promotion
Examples include: how to address the impact of climate change and pandemic restrictions on youth mental health, or combat the housing affordability crisis as a determinant of poor mental health.
Opioid use
Examples include: strategies for addressing the opioid crisis in Northern and Indigenous communities, evidence for use of newer opioid agonist treatments, or viable harm reduction policy options.
Resource types
The resource types identified as most useful are:
- Webinars
- Reports summarizing all available evidence on a given topic
- Spotlights on promising practices in community settings
Other services
The other services identified as most useful are the:
- Formation of partnerships or collaboratives (e.g. Communities of Practice/Interest) that span across sectors, regions, institutions or initiatives
- Coordination of interactive events, online or in-person
- Building of discussion forums that offer opportunities for virtual knowledge sharing
Tell us what you think: Do these needs resonate with you?
These survey responses will help to inform an upcoming initiative in which we’ll look deeper into what the greatest needs are of Ontario’s mental health and addictions system.
Stay tuned for more information and please don’t hesitate to be in touch with any questions or requests: kmb@camh.ca