Our Progress
BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services is invested in advancing knowledge and innovation in everything we do.
What we’ve accomplished
Our services are guided by, and reflect a deep commitment to, person-centred, trauma-informed, and anti-racist principles. We’re proud of our record of continuous improvement in all that we do.
Here is a selection of our recent accomplishments:
2023
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Centre for Learning
We launched the Centre for Learning website, which consolidates innovative learning resources for mental health and substance use providers. Funded by the Ministry of Mental Health and Addictions and developed by BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services, this online hub offers new and emerging knowledge, best practices, evidence-based learning, and informational resources.
BC Concurrent Disorders Conference
BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services, with the University of British Columbia, held the third annual BC Concurrent Disorders Conference, which focused on “Best and promising practices: understanding and celebrating the emerging practices in concurrent disorders.” The conference provided a space to discuss the most up-to-date evidence from research, combined with clinical expertise from treatment providers across Canada, the UK, India, Spain, and the US.
2024-2026 Strategic Plan
BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services launched a bold new strategic plan to guide the organization for the next three years. The plan ensures the program is accountable to patients and clients, staff, and partners.
It has tangible outcomes, is achievable, and is flexible enough to be updated as needs and priorities shift over the next three years. Learn more about our strategic priorities.
CST Cerner and FLASH activation
On Oct. 14, 2023, the Forensic Psychiatric Hospital started using the new clinical information system, CST Cerner, as well as a new integrated legal application, the Forensic Legal Application Solution for Healthcare (FLASH).
Provincial Assessment Centre
The Provincial Health Services Authority and BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services welcomed the Provincial Assessment Centre (PAC) to our organization in 2023. PAC provides services to individuals with developmental disabilities and concurrent psychiatric illness or behavioural challenges.
Previously, PAC was operated by Community Living BC.
BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services Research Day
On Nov. 7, 2023, visionaries, trailblazers, and researchers came together for Research Day 2023 to dive into the world of translational research, spanning across all stages of life; and to tackle complex mental health and substance use issues.
Understanding Each Other Together (UNITE) Family Video Series
A three-part animated video series called Stories of Stigma brought audiences along on a journey into the stories of family members of people with lived and living experience of mental health complexities, substance use issues and criminalization.
The Patient Experience and Community Engagement team created the videos in collaboration with a project team of student designers, faculty, and staff from the Emily Carr University Health Design Lab.
Breaking the Silence: A community gathering on stigma in mental health and substance use
100 patient and family partners, front-line staff and leaders came together to address and combat stigma faced by people living with mental health and substance use challenges.
Lived Experience Advisors and Partners (LEAP) Report
The report, “BE BOLD. MAKE CHANGES. Perspectives from LEAP on unmet needs of individuals with complex mental health and substance use issues” summarized insights and perspectives raised by the LEAP team through consultations and interviews held over a 12-month period with the Provincial Mental Health and Substance Use Network.
Community Transition Teams Gathering: This multi-day event brought together staff from all 10 provincial correctional centres to learn, build teams, and obtain a better understanding of mental health and substance use, and Indigenous cultural safety & humility.
2022
In partnership with the Ministry of Health, BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services announced the new Forensic Assertive Community Treatment (FACT) team. A first-of-its-kind intervention in BC, the FACT team aims to prevent criminal justice issues by supporting clients' mental health and substance use needs.
Modelled on assertive community treatment (ACT) teams, which have resulted in substantially better outcomes for individuals and their communities, the FACT team serves the Fraser South region.
The Online Concurrent Disorders Competency Toolkit (see Centre for Learning website) is an innovative new educational resource for those who provide services to people with concurrent mental health and substance use challenges, including health care professionals, staff in complex care or supportive housing units, outreach workers in drop-in centres, and more.
The toolkit is designed to guide learners through a self-assessment of their skills and knowledge and to then set learning goals for professional development.
The second annual BC Concurrent Disorders Conference focused on the theme "Access, Quality & Capacity". Participants discussed and learned from people with lived experience, and national and international experts who work in concurrent disorders, about how to collectively improve BC's mental health and substance use system of care.
The event welcomed over 1,300 registered attendees.
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The Demystifying Concurrent Disorders Webinar Series is a quarterly webinar series to help patients and families understand topics relating to co-occurring mental health and substance use challenges, or concurrent disorders. Participants learn about things like trauma-informed practice, the Mental Health Act, the forensic system, and more.
In keeping with our commitment to promote knowledge translation and exchange, BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services launched Provincial Mental Health and Substance Use Learning Rounds.
The bi-weekly virtual events provide a platform for staff, clinicians, researchers, and others to gain a deeper understanding of issues specific to mental health and addiction treatment, and to inspire new ideas for improving care.
In order to address gaps in the province's mental health and substance use care system, BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services created the Provincial Mental Health and Substance Use (MHSU) Network.
Made up of diverse stakeholders and perspectives, the network provides an evidence-informed way to solve systemic challenges faced by people with complex needs relating to mental health, substance use issues, acquired brain injury, developmental disability, challenging or aggressive behaviours or involvement with the criminal justice system.
2021
BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services continued to effectively manage the COVID-19 pandemic with heightened infection prevention and control measures across all sites, as well as incident command centres and an emergency operations centre to monitor issues.
The program successfully completed a vaccination campaign including training for nurse immunizers to administer vaccines across ten provincial correctional facilities, as well as Burnaby Centre for Mental Health and Addiction, Heartwood Centre for Women and the Forensic Psychiatric Hospital.
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BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services hosted its first BC Concurrent Disorders Conference in March 2021 to advance knowledge in co-occurring mental health and addictions disorders treatment across the province.
The event had over 1,700 registered attendees and featured keynote talks, panel discussions and 14 interactive workshops with national and international speakers.
In October 2021, BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services opened a new, state-of-the-art, 105-bed treatment centre for people with the most complex, co-occurring mental health and substance use disorders in the province.
The Red Fish Healing Centre is a purpose-built facility designed around a new, evidence-based model of care, which informs how clients will receive treatment that is tailored to their individual needs and strengths.
As part of our commitment to advancing health equity for Indigenous people, BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services coordinated and aligned initiatives with the First Nations Health Authority, regional health authorities and government through the Tripartite Committee on First Nations Health.
The program also launched a three-year initiative to eliminate stigma and address racism; increased representation of Indigenous patient and family voices in all decision making; built partnerships with kʷikʷəƛəm (Kwikwetlem First Nation) to increase cultural competence for staff; and facilitated traditional healing ceremonies for Indigenous clients throughout the service.
To address gaps in the province’s mental health and substance use care system, BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services created the Provincial Mental Health and Substance Use (MHSU) Network.
Made up of diverse stakeholders and perspectives, the network provides an evidence-informed way to solve systemic challenges faced by people with complex needs relating to mental health, substance use issues, acquired brain injury, developmental disability, challenging or aggressive behaviours or involvement with the criminal justice system.
BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services enhanced the delivery of crisis line services in BC by establishing an effective provincial program for crisis intervention. Under this project, the program established a provincial steering committee with representation from regional health authorities and the First Nations Health Authority, developed an enhanced service model based on best practice, engaged with patients and Indigenous partners to strengthen the model, and identified requirements and technology needs for the service.
In order to strengthen the continuum of care throughout the province, BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services finalized its Virtual and Digital Health Strategy & Roadmap and established a steering committee to oversee its implementation. The program also launched a clinical digital messaging platform to support text messaging with clients in the community, specifically forensic regional clinic and community transition team clients.
Virtual care was also built into the Red Fish Healing Centre, with tablets available for clients, digital reader boards to display program content, and plans to turn the centre into a virtual innovation hub for piloting transformative technologies.
Through a multi-year project to disrupt stigma relating to mental health and substance use, the program co-designed and launched a three-part animated video series telling the stories of people with lived experience of these stigmas.
The program also launched a Playbook on Compensating Patients and Families (PDF) to help standardize honoraria for patients, clients and families; developed a “Co-Created with Patients and Families” symbol to clearly identify materials that have been developed with people with lived experience; and established a patient- and family-led health literacy working group to review education and research materials to improve language accessibility.
The Forensic Psychiatric Hospital continued its ongoing collaborations with WorkSafe BC and union stakeholders to improve overall safety and the quality of care, leading to further reductions in time lost to violence in the workplace.
The hospital also implemented a number of recommendations from the Guarding Minds at Work survey, including the roll-out of site-wide bullying and harassment education for staff.