BELOW ARE SOME OF THE AREAS WHERE MONEY RAISED $$ FROM THE 2021 PWP CHALLENGE WILL GO DURING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC
Helping kids during COVID-19
Prior to COVID-19, CHEO was facing a surge in pediatric mental health cases. We had seen a 90 percent increase in mental health emergency visits since 2010. Layer on isolation and uncertainty from the pandemic, intensified by fears about a child's battle with despair and anxiety, and that puts this heartbreaking crisis into overdrive. CHEO is doing all it can to support these kids through virtual appointments and access to our inpatient unit. With your support, we have been able to:
Providing better care faster
The Choice and Partnership Approach (CAPA) at CHEO
CAPA was launched in 2016 with the goal of reducing wait times and improving the quality of mental health care for our region’s children and youth. CAPA provides care by first identifying what the patient/family really wants and needs and what they can change in order to achieve it. Working in partnership, staff at CHEO and the family then select treatments that best suit a patient’s needs, while continuously optimizing the delivery system by analyzing data gathered daily about the entire population of patients coming through the door. This program, with your support, has allowed the team to see trends, train staff, and plan for the future. Here are some important highlights that are helping kids faster:
Early intervention is key
Infant and Early Childhood mental health service at CHEO
The foundations for mental health are laid in the first few years of life. Children’s early experiences influence their brain development, which impacts the way children think, feel, act, and relate. For children who experience social and emotional difficulties at a young age, early intervention with specialized treatments is critical to preventing longer-term mental health challenges and to promoting resilience in the face of adversity.
CHEO is piloting an Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health service that is designed to treat some of our most vulnerable infants and children from birth to age six. Patients who have interacted with child protective services or who experienced neonatal complications have been identified as the first priority.
Before treatment, young children struggle with complex social, emotional, and behavioural difficulties. This might manifest as feeding and sleeping difficulties in an infant, difficulties bonding with a parent, significant worries, or aggressive and defiant behaviours.
The main goals of intervention are to help parents develop a more positive and secure relationship with their child and be able to tune in to and meet the needs of their child in a nurturing and responsive manner. This change in relationship has a significant impact on the child’s emotions and behaviours, as well as on the caregiver's level of perceived stress.
Thanks to donor support from events like Virtual Punching With Purpose:
Helping to support girls and boys with eating disorders
Eating disorders, which can be seen in boys and girls, develop for many different reasons. Eating disorders may stem from underlying anxiety or depression, or from overwhelming feelings of powerlessness as young people move through childhood into adolescence and ultimately adulthood. Eating disorders are the third most common chronic illness among adolescent girls, with life-threatening consequences and the highest mortality rates of all psychiatric disorders. It is estimated that close to 15 percent of girls and young women will develop an eating disorder. If this illness is not treated quickly and successfully in adolescence, girls can develop a life-long, debilitating disease.
While females are more likely to experience eating disorders than males, there has been a noticeable increase in boys who are being admitted to CHEO with eating disorders. CHEO sees over 70 new assessments of eating disorder cases each year with many requiring urgent admission due to medical instability. As a donor, you are part of an invaluable community that ensures the best possible care for CHEO’s children and youth.
Thanks to your support, youth were able to benefit from extra hours of group therapy which are funded fully by donors. By adding these resources, patients are achieving their weekly treatment goals at a faster rate. Youth who participated in the extended hours of the Day Treatment Program were:
These accomplishments will have a positive influence for the rest of their lives and would not have been possible without your support.
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MESSAGE FROM CHEO
On behalf of CHEO’s Mental Health Team and the CHEO Foundation, we thank you for your generosity and support through Virtual Punching With Purpose 2021 event.