Providing culturally safe and supportive mental health care to Black youth

I think mental health is is something that is that we’re scoring poorly on across the communities, but for black community, I think we’re disproportionately having a bad case with it. A new study by the Canadian Mental Health Association shows rates of depression among black Canadians were six times higher than the general population, and that 53% of black participants of the survey reported racism within the medical field. Not great stories about the experiences of community at what are called rapid assessment and treatment clinics. And it just sounded like something needed to be done To tackle the issue head on. The Black Physicians Association of Ontario has created a hybrid conference focused on mental health training for healthcare providers to deliver culturally safe and supportive care. The BPAO says the main focus is on black youth. They can expect to get trauma informed, understanding. They can expect to know how to respond to people in crisis and understand when someone’s in crisis. Because I I also think a lot of people don’t know when it’s time to go get help or when, you know, your family doctor needs to do a referral and things like that. And so all of that is to equip those people who are what we call first responders, right? We always think of first responders just as paramedics. But when it comes to mental health, your first responders are teachers or the guidance counselors are, you know, psychologists, nurses. So every single person that is working with community can can be part of this event. The event hopes to teach people specialized strategies when dealing with black youth that are facing mental health difficulties or psychosis. It runs on May 4th from 8:00 AM to 4:00 PM, and you can find more information by visiting bpo.org in Toronto. I’m Brandon Rowe, Four City News.