With mental health and addiction challenges on the rise, a Brampton and Toronto program provides rapid access to help

Sometimes, help can’t wait one hour, let alone several weeks or even months.

“As soon as I was ready, the services were there, which is really essential,” Rebecca tells INsauga.com. 

Rebecca (whose name has been changed to protect her family’s privacy) is a long-time client of William Osler Health System’s mental health and addictions program. The addictions services program, which serves the health care organization’s Brampton and Toronto patients, is unique in the sense that many of its offerings are immediately accessible to people who make the (often difficult) decision to seek help. 

For Rebecca, her journey with mental health support began 30 years ago when she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Living with the disease and navigating life with family members who struggle with addictions (including a spouse with alcoholism) has never been easy–but she says the low-barrier program and its vast continuum of individual and group counselling options have helped smooth the bumpy road along the way. 

“When I returned [to Osler] about 10 years ago, it was to see a psychiatrist. I have many family members who live with addictions. Because of my spouse, my psychiatrist asked me to receive some counselling for family members of people with addictions,” Rebecca says. 

“I wasn’t ready at that point. It took quite a while and little did I know it was going to be the best thing that ever happened to me. It helped me more than any services that I had tried and I had sought out services so much over the years.” 

Megen Galbraith , the clinical team lead of addictions services at Osler, says community members can access a vast array of programming that focuses on substance use, eating disorders, mental health and more. 

The addictions services program offers one-on-one counselling, group sessions, workshops, youth addiction medicine and psychiatry. 

“The majority of our programs do not have a wait list, so we’re very low barrier. It’s self-referral, which means you don’t need to go see your doctor and have them put in paperwork or any of that. You can call our number and you’ll reach an addiction counsellor who assesses you to help you decide what the right program is,” Galbraith tells INsauga.com.

She also says the program is diverse, offering a continuum from harm reduction to abstinence. 

“So whether you’re just thinking about maybe making a change, whether you’ve started making a change, whether you’ve reached your goal and need more support, we can help.” 

Flexibility is also a key component of the program, with sessions being available at various times of day to make it easier for people with work and family commitments to receive support. Galbraith also says that by offering intensive one-on-one counselling and group therapy, people have more options and therefore, less backlog to navigate. 

“You can choose a mix of both. Some people only do group, some people only do one-to-one. Most people do a mix of both.”

Galbraith says by offering people the option to address issues gradually (harm reduction),  immediately (abstinence), or somewhere in between, the program can meet patients where they are. 

“We often talk about harm reduction on a continuum, and that includes abstinence. So it’s not one or the other. We talk about it all together because people may come into our service and say, ‘You know what? I’m ready to make a change to my alcohol use, but maybe not my cannabis use yet. That’s harm reduction. We also have some people say, ‘I want to quit everything and I’m ready to stop now,’” she says.  

“We will work with people wherever they’re at because we also find people move around that continuum. They may start in one place and move to the other.” 

Galbraith says the program doesn’t just help people confront alcohol or drug addiction, but also dependence on gambling, gaming and other habit-forming activities that they find are interfering with their lives. 

Osler also offers a withdrawal management centre that offers non-medical and short-term residential services for people 16 years of age and older who are intoxicated, in withdrawal or in a crisis related to alcohol, drugs or gambling. 

The program, which Rebecca says has been evolving steadily over the past decade that she’s been involved, is maintaining quick access to counselling at a time when mental health and addictions are on the rise. 

During the height of the pandemic, a campaign by the Canadian Mental Health Association revealed that, in 2020, 28,000 children and youth were on wait lists for mental health care, with some young people looking at waits of over two years.

The campaign said 74 per cent of Ontarians reported experiencing increased mental health and addiction challenges, with 42 per cent reporting increased substance use or gambling. While the pandemic has ended, substance abuse and mental health challenges remain a significant public health crisis in Ontario (as they were before the COVID-19 outbreak).

The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Canada’s leading mental health teaching hospital, reports that, in any given year, one in five Canadians experiences a mental illness. CAMH notes that for many, substance abuse and mental illness often overlap, and that mental illness and substance use disorders are leading causes of disability in Canada. 

“The disease burden of mental illness and substance use in Ontario is 1.5 times higher than all cancers put together and more than seven times that of all infectious diseases,” CAMH’s website reads. 

“This includes years lived with less than full function and years lost to early death. It is estimated that 67,000 deaths per year are attributable to substance use in Canada.” 

Galbraith says that some programming can take longer to access, such as a 28-day stabilization program designed for homeless patients who require inpatient care. 

“We have 10 beds for that, so we focus on our unhoused population. People will come and stay in that 28-day program and attend our intensive day addiction program. We often have a wait list for that. It can take one to two months to get in.”

Dr. Ahmed Mansour, a psychiatrist with Osler, says the addictions services program has been scaling up to keep pace with community demand. 

“There has been a rise in accidental drug and alcohol toxicity-related deaths. In Ontario, accidental substance-related deaths rose from 1,660 in 2018 to 2,796 in 2022,” Mansour tells INsauga.com.

“So basically, we’re talking about 4.5 deaths per day in 2018, rising to almost eight per day in 2022.” 

Mansour says that while the program has evolved to better meet the needs of people suffering with addictions, the family program also helps alleviate strain in the broader community by providing support and raising awareness of what problematic addictions look like. 

“Family members of those sensitive populations come and learn about addiction,” he says. 

For Rebecca, participating in family programming and workshops has given her tools she didn’t realize she could use. 

“ I’d say the most important thing I’ve learned is boundaries. I know I’m not alone in struggling with boundaries and not really knowing what boundaries are and how to use them in everyday life,” she says, adding that the programming also focuses on stress management and meditation.

She also says it helps to know there are various options, rather than a “one-size-fits-all” approach. 

“The variety makes you feel safe because there’s no pressure to fit into a box, you know? I love the workshops, I love the individual counselling, I love it all. I really love the workshops because that is where I learn my skills.” 

Mansour reiterates that when it comes to helping the most vulnerable, having virtually no waiting period for counselling is crucial. 

“The number one issue with the sensitive population is the waiting times. At William Osler, the waiting times are almost zero. When I go in, I will have a consult waiting for me, whereas in some other hospitals, those patients, if they want to see a psychiatrist, it’ll take them six to eight months.”

Mansour says that while the province overall could benefit from more mental health and addictions services, Osler is able to manage demand at Brampton and Etobicoke locations because it’s well-staffed (patients have access to nurse practitioners and addiction counsellors are embedded in Brampton Civic and Etobicoke General’s emergency departments) and offers a range of care options. 

For Rebecca, she says the hardest part is seeking help in the first place–especially when someone is overwhelmed with work, school or family life.

That said, she’s adamant that people who take the leap will be happy they did.

“It’s so worth it, it pays back tenfold. Addictions make life difficult for the family and the people that have them, so when you seek the help that you need and, and you make the time, it makes your time better. It makes your life better.”