Public Safety committee  I was impressed by the plan for the six objectives that were articulated by Correctional Services Canada: screening and assessment upon admission; having primary mental health care in all institutions; developing the intermediate mental health units for offenders who require a hi

Public Safety committee  I was going to add to your comment that all prisons have abstinence cultures that are oriented around the twelve-step movement. They're already there. Again, what is important is thinking of where the alternatives are we can build on and tap into. Just to support your question,

Public Safety committee  I'm not sure what you mean by correctional plans, but this work actually does require, as much as possible, identifying problems early to intervene actively when people are in jail and then plan and offer continuing care. I'm assuming, when you speak of correctional planning, tha

Public Safety committee  CSC's Addiction Research Centre has developed some impressive protocols for doing culture-based treatment with aboriginals. Those are materials that are available. I'm not sure how well disseminated they are, or how well delivered they are across the country, but there are these

Public Safety committee  Indeed. I wasn't speaking about this as a program in prisons. I should clarify that. I'm talking about a substantial body of research that has been done with people with severe, persistent mental illness who also have substance use problems. The problem with those populations is

Public Safety committee  No. In Ontario the government has made a substantial investment, and now I think there are over 60 ACT teams--assertive community treatment--in Ontario alone, and it's seen as a best practice in working with severe, persistent mental illness and addictions. So it's definitely whe

Public Safety committee  It's obviously a very important question: drug-free prisons from a systems point of view. When I think of what goes on there, I think right now of prison cultures that are very oriented to obtaining and using drugs. So are there things you could do to shift that culture or to cre

Public Safety committee  I'm not in a position, actually...because I am not familiar on the ground with their programs and how they are delivered. I am familiar with attempts to develop models; for example, in the treatment of women with substance use and mental health issues some good models have been d

Public Safety committee  Yes, I would. In fact, I would say that this is an ideal way of thinking about it. When we work with people with even serious addictions, the length of time they need to be in a residential program or whatever would be measured at most in months. The important work, actually, i

Public Safety committee  I think acute withdrawal depends on the circumstances of people's entry. Certainly upon arrest some individuals might well be drug-dependent and would show a variety of withdrawal symptoms from whatever substance they were on. That's one level of dependence, if you will. But if p

Public Safety committee  Right, but your own report I think gives this figure, and it describes people as having serious addiction. That is more than moderate, shall we say. It's a very significant problem.

Public Safety committee  From a treatment point of view, we have experience with drug screening. We have clients who want us to do this. We have other people who are reluctant to do it. But we need to determine what model we're operating from. Is this primarily a health problem, or are we trying to impos

Public Safety committee  First of all, it's worth noting that about three-quarters of people who seek addiction treatment have a prior mental health history. There is an important relationship to note between these. Again, it's just a common thing, so one of the realities we can speak about is that peopl

Public Safety committee  Those were very stimulating comments. I think Intervention, the TV show, makes great television. It's not best practice, in terms of how to deal with families. A fair bit of my work has been with families affected by concurrent disorders. We have to be careful here to not charac

Public Safety committee  I think education is one strategy. I'm not sure what the deterrent strategies would be except to have better detection as people come in. I do think it's worth noting that people who are in the criminal justice system with substance use problems are more likely than others to com