On Thursday, September 27, Lynne McVey talked about the need to invest in mental health during the Canadian Academy of Psychiatric Epidemiology (CAPE) Annual Scientific Symposium. Ms. Lynne McVey participated in a discussion panel with two major decision-makers in the field of mental health who are also partners of the Douglas Institute:

• Mr. Howard Chodos, from the Mental Health Commission of Canada
• Dr. André Delorme, Director of Mental Health for the Ministère de la Santé et des Services sociaux of Quebec.

The panel members talked about ways to show and convince, MDs, health professionals and policy-makers that there is an urgent need to invest in quality indicators in order to go beyond the discussion stage and move forward with action and results.

Lynne McVey stressed the importance of creating change by measuring outcomes throughout the continuum of mental health care, sharing and comparing results, and standardizing activities to provide better services to our patients. "We need to choose the key essential mental health indicators and share best practices. These actions will also show policy-makers that the mental health system provides a good return on investment".

The symposium was held at Fernand-Seguin Research Centre at Hôpital Louis-H. Lafontaine