National Defence committee  Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, I'm Captain (Navy) Cyd Courchesne, the medical advisor to the Chief of the Air Staff, and the director of aerospace medicine for the Canadian Forces. I would like to provide a brief background and explain the roles and responsibilities

National Defence committee  I'm not sure what the question is. Could you...?

National Defence committee  On the first part of your question, I'm not sure I know what you're referring to--this study of 8,000 people.

National Defence committee  I'm not familiar with that study, so I don't feel comfortable commenting on the--

National Defence committee  In general terms, if we're talking about mental health, it's general medical knowledge that a large percentage of individuals do not seek medical help, basically because they are in denial about their symptoms or because there is a lot of stigma attached to mental health problems

National Defence committee  I would defer that to our mental health colleagues responsible for formulating programs with respect to the delivery of mental health care services.

National Defence committee  I'm speaking outside of my realm here, because I don't advise the Surgeon General on mental health issues, but through collaboration with our colleagues and all the initiatives that we have put into increasing access to mental health, I would hope that we are breaking the stigmas

National Defence committee  Thank you, Commander Briggs. I feel totally out of my comfort zone in answering that. I would have to defer to our mental health specialists who advise the Surgeon General. I would just like to point out to the committee that any treatment introduced into the Canadian Forces is

National Defence committee  I will try to answer your question, Mr. Nadeau. Every effort is made to provide services to military personnel in the language of their choice.

National Defence committee  All Canadian Force clinics are not bilingual, but we certainly have staff…

National Defence committee  If a Francophone soldier from an Anglophone unit requests services in French, we will make every possible effort to accommodate him.

National Defence committee  The Air Force is my area of responsibility.

National Defence committee  Generally speaking, no. When members leave the Canadian Forces, or when they are released, they must rely on medical services provided by the province where they decided to retire to. Our mandate ends the day a member leaves the Canadian Forces. Our mandate is to provide health c

National Defence committee  I'll wade into this one. I think the issue of denial is not at the time we diagnose a person. In most of our experience—and I'm talking as a medical officer right now—once we have diagnosed them, we try to get them access to care. What's reported as denial is people's not coming

National Defence committee  The biennial periodic health examination does ask questions that will seek out symptoms of that.