Priority 1- Comprehensive Family Engagement

Keystone has an established internal Family Engagement Team that is supported by a Family Engagement Specialist from the Centre of Excellence of Child and Youth Mental Health.  We have made it a priority for all Keystone staff and board members to have Family Engagement Training; consequently, an updated training for staff and board members occurred during this year. Keystone also hosted two face to face Family Advisory Meetings this past fall and are planning a specialized family engagement face to face session with a focus on evaluating our new Quick Response Service. Our family board members have been a critical asset to our organization.  Support for our local Parent’s for Children’s Mental Health Grey Bruce Chapter and a solid working relationship with the Centre of Excellence has continued throughout this past year.

Priority 2- Meaningful Youth Engagement

At our local “We Care” event, Keystone delivered a workshop on Youth Engagement jointly with the Centre of Excellence.  We also hosted two Youth Engagement training sessions with all Keystone staff and a number of board members.  An evening training session was open to the public in which a number of community partners and youth participated.  Keystone is planning a youth advisory session with our residential youth later this year.  The youth board members have been busy promoting mental health and the services we offer.  Distribution of “glow in the dark” bracelets in all high schools in Grey Bruce was part of this campaign. A poster campaign for mental health awareness was introduced at all the high schools within Grey and Bruce Counties.

Priority 3- Address the Acute Care Needs of Children and Adolescents in Grey and Bruce

This priority has been broken down into a number of activities.  The first activity has focused on ensuring a clear and available pathway to acute care services in London.  Our agency has actively participated during the meetings facilitated by the Southwest LHIN Pathway Planning Committee.  These meetings included a child and adolescent focus and have also been broken down into service areas as there are differing needs throughout the South West Region.  We have participated in the development of an algorithm and common assessment tools.  Locally, we have also been engaged in discussions with our health partners to ensure that we are all working together to service all of the children in a timely manner.  We believe that we are making steady progress in achieving this priority.

Recruitment of a child and adolescent psychiatrist for Grey and Bruce continues to be a top priority.  We have engaged closely with our partners at Grey Bruce Health Services in their tireless efforts at recruitment.  We are hopeful that these efforts will pay off during this year.  Addendum – successful recruitment as of October 2018.

Our third activity focused on securing 365/24-7 operational funding for our 7 – bed crisis residential service.  Presently we are only able to operate 46 weeks a year.  To date, we have been unsuccessful in securing funds but we are continuing our efforts in this critical area.

Priority 4- Helping to meet the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Needs of Indigenous Populations

Keystone has continued on its journey of becoming a more culturally competent organization. We have benefitted from the advice of our Indigenous board members, ceremonial practices at our events and held intensive training with Estelle Simard on culturally restorative practices.  We enjoy the partnerships and guidance from Saugeen First Nations, Nawash First Nations and Southwest Ontario Aboriginal Health Access Centre (SOAHAC).  In collaboration with our partners, we delivered a very successful 2^nd annual Life Promotion Camp for grade 7 and 8 Indigenous students.  We have recently entered into a partnership with Saugeen First Nations to jointly hire, supervise and support the Aboriginal Mental Health and Addictions worker.  This position will be integrated with our organization thereby providing seamless access to all of our services.

Priority 5- Address the Core Service Gap in Specialized Consultation, specifically psychological assessments

To date, we have been unsuccessful in securing additional funds to provide psychological assessments but we are committed to continuing our search for funding.

Community Mental Health Plan Priorities

Priority 1- Community Partner and Pathway Development

We have worked hard at continuing to maintain our established partnerships; meeting frequently in order to enhance services in our region, trouble shoot, reduce duplication, create pathways and develop ways to work collaboratively. We feel this has been successfully demonstrated in our partnerships with Grey Bruce Health Services, School Boards, Child Welfare, Indigenous Communities, and Probation Services, just to name a few.  We believe that establishing and fostering community relationships is an important requirement that we actively practice.

Priority 2- To Further Develop Social Media and Communication Strategies
Keystone has developed working groups to begin to address the above priority.  Our youth are the driving force behind a communication working group where the primary goal is to increase the profile and awareness of Keystone and its services.  The efforts of this group have included a poster awareness contest inclusive of all high schools within Grey and Bruce.  In addition, the group have distributed Keystone bracelets to all guidance departments in the all high schools of Grey and Bruce Counties to raise awareness of Keystone services.  Our youth have also been involved in exploring social media sites to help us determine what may work best for our organization.  The data group is investigating what statistical information will be most helpful to include in our messaging.  In addition, we are planning to refresh our website.