Free Mental Health Facility Essay Example

Following the American Psychological Association’s Guidelines

The Ontario Shores Centre for Mental Health Sciences is located in Ontario, Canada . It is a public teaching hospital striving to be the best of its kind, catering to many individuals with mental illnesses ranging from serious to minor. Outpatient services are offered at Ontario Shores, though the facility also houses many residents who require around-the-clock care . Catering to youthful individuals with mental health issues, as well as the middle-aged and elderly, Ontario Shores seeks to provide a safe environment for all who need services there.
With six locations in all, the centre is able to offer a variety of services. Two of the locations provide outpatient services, including counseling, as well as relaxation classes such as yoga and meditation . These implementations were a part of the strategic planning for outpatients who were not transitioning well after being released from the facility. All of the facilities attempt to offer community outreach and support; they are aware individuals need to know there are facilities available to support them in times of crisis . As such, the facility campaigns publically for mental health, but also for seeking help to attain mental health, and not to be ashamed for doing so. They serve the greater area of Ontario, young and old.
While there are a few ways in which Ontario Shores addresses diversity, the greatest and most recent, has been their switch to electronic health records for their patients . Many mental health facilities lack the funding to switch to EHR records; similarly, they do not see the point. However, the attendants at Ontario Shores understood the switch would benefit them, as well as the patients in a number of ways. Not only would records be easier to access, but also the records could keep cultural and ethnic information on hand. Most importantly, records can be converted into any language with the click of a button, allowing many patients to cross a previously impenetrable cultural barrier . Now, for example, if a doctor is servicing a French, Chinese, or Arabic patient at the facility, and is having trouble explaining a diagnosis, with the simple click of a button, the electronic health record can be converted to the patient’s native language. This allows the patient to read their medical records, diagnosis, and even their medications in a language they fully understand .
Furthermore, the benefits of Ontario Shores being a teaching hospital have proven beneficial to addressing diversity. Older doctors, for instance, are not always privy to the cultural changes the Canadian landscape is going through. However, younger doctors, who are more sensitive to cultural changes, are able to offer more input on the subject . More importantly, the teacher-student relationships have left Ontario Shores’ managers more susceptible than other mental health facilities’ managers to new ideas, as well as new ways of addressing things. In a Case Study, entitled, “Manager as Coach,” fifty managers from various mental health facilities attended a workshop wherein they learned about diversity, as well as new strategies to solve conflicts in the workplace. It was found that individuals from teaching hospitals, including Ontario Shores, were more open to trying new ideas. The Ontario Shores managers returned, ready to employ new marketing strategies, which they now do, and ready to hire translators, something that is also in the works at the urging of strategic planner, Laurence Kirmayer.
While employing electronic health records and hiring translators is a good start to any facility’s diversity inclusion, it is far from all that needs to be done. These are, at best, in-between communications. What Ontario Shores truly needs are bilingual doctors and therapists . They are beginning to employ bilingual marketing . This is more than many other mental health facilities attempt to do. However, if foreign patients see services addressed directly to them, in their native language, it could be disillusioning to them to enter a facility for help, only to be greeted in a foreign language. Furthermore, other relaxation techniques in other cultures should be examined. While Western culture is fawning over yoga and meditation as a way to relax, this may not be the chosen way for all cultures to center themselves, or overcome mental unrest. Ontario Shores could examine their populace and study the preferred methods of relaxation for existing cultures they help, including these practices along with yoga and meditation in their outpatient services. It would also be important for Ontario Shores to understand how to deliver their message to different cultures. For example, Caucasians are more open to accepting help for mental illness than Hispanics . There are many cultures that believe hiding mental health problems is the best way to deal with it, and that exposure of such a problem would bring shame to themselves and their family. While it is respectful of Ontario Shores to try shedding this stigma, the facility should also be sensitive to long-held cultural values in order to help as many people as they can.
In sum, Ontario Shores is a helpful mental health facility that strives to recognize diversity. They are an in-patient, as well as out-patient centre with six locations spread throughout Ontario. Helping the youth, middle-aged, and elderly of Canada, they attempt to recognize diversity and cross language barriers in a variety of ways, including using electronic health records. However, they still have work to do. Most of their efforts only allow patients a bridge between themselves and a doctor, when what the facility needs are doctors who are culturally prepared themselves. Despite these inadequacies, Ontario Shores still remains ahead of many other mental healthcare facilities, both in Canada and the United States.

References

An Impressive First for Ontario Shores. (n.d.). Retrieved March 4, 2015, from Meditech Magazine: https://www.meditech.com/magazine/pages/0712_ontarioshores.htm
Kirmayer, L. (2010). Rethinking Cultural Competence. Quebec: Advanced Study Institute in Cultural Psychiatry.
Klinger, E. V., Carlini, S. V., Gonzalez, I., Hubert, S., Linder, J. A., Rigotti, N. A., et al. (2014). Accuracy of Race, Ethnicity, and Language Preference in an Electronic Health Record. Journal of General Internal Medicine, 39-56.
Murdoch, S. (2012, August 21). Coaching: Blazing Your Own Trail. Retrieved March 4, 2015, from Knowledge Center: http://www.cpiworld.com/knowledge-center/articles/coaching-blazing-your-own-trail
Ontario Shores Centre for Mental Health Sciences. (n.d.). Retrieved March 4, 2015, from http://www.ontarioshores.ca/
(2014). Strategic Plan. Ontario Shores.