The B.C. Ministry of Health along with the Ministry of Children and Family Development have unveiled two initiatives the province says will improve access to youth mental-health and substance-use services.

The first is a map that lists approximately 350 facility locations alongside contact information and brief descriptions of services are offered.

“Feedback from families who have received services in the past has indicated that it can be difficult to navigate the complex mental health system to find the services they need,” reads a February 4 media release. “Parents and youth can now visit the new interactive online map to find supports and services close to home.”

The second initiative is an expansion of a new intake process that ran on a trial basis at 20 child and youth mental-health offices through 2014.

“The new intake clinic allows clients and their families to meet directly with a clinician and discuss a plan for services or treatment during their initial visit,” reads the government release. “Thanks to the new model, wait times have been drastically reduced and clients can now find out if they are eligible for child and youth mental health services, usually the same day as their assessment, compared to the previous wait time of up to 12 weeks.”

On January 7, the Georgia Straight published an in-depth report on the challenges and wait-times faced by Vancouver residents trying to gain access to mental-health services.

That article included statistics obtained from Vancouver Coastal Health (VCH) and B.C. Housing through freedom of information legislation, revealomg the extent to which those agencies are overwhelmed.

During the first half of 2014, the median time an individual waited for their first meeting with a Vancouver Coastal Health (VCH) Community Mental Health team usually fluctuated between 10 and 20 days. The wait for VCH’s outpatient psychiatry team was 20 to 40 days (down from a high of 91 days in early 2013).

Waits for VCH supportive housing are substantially longer. For the period January 2012 to November 2014, the average number of days an individual waited for placement in a licensed care home was 532. For an enhanced-housing service, the wait was 385 days; for supported-independent-living sites, it was 271 days; for supported apartment blocks, the wait was 219 days; for group homes, it was 85.

In recent years, B.C. Housing’s waiting list for supportive housing has more than quadrupled, from 1,165 names in January 2011 to 5,642 in November 2014.

Today Children and Family Development Minister Stephanie Cadieux announced the new services at the HOpe Centre for mental health at Lions Gate Hospital.

“We understand it can be frustrating and overwhelming for families when they need to find and access mental health and substance use services,” she said quoted in the release. “This map, and the expansion of the new child and youth mental health intake process will go a long way to ease those frustrations and help to ensure vulnerable children and youth get the supports they need as soon as possible.”