National Defence Committee on Nov. 1st, 2012

[Col Scott McLeod]

The U.S. Army, as was pointed out, is actually looking at doing this research now. In fact, I believe they're past the pilot project now and are extending that research. It may be most valuable for us to learn from that study as well, as it's coming out. Colonel Jetly, our senior psychiatrist, has already expressed that interest. He's very interested in hearing what's going to come out of that.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Maybe there's some real possibility of the Canadian military piggybacking on the American military to see whether this does actually work.

You talk to the vets, both people inside the military but also outside the military or who were in the military, and PTSD is the most obvious thing, but it's also PTSD-like symptoms. It seems to crop up in very strange circumstances.

Is that it, Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Thank you. The time has expired.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

We are going to go onto the five-minute round now.

Witnesses, please make sure that you keep your responses as concise as possible so that members can get in as many questions as they want.

Mr. Opitz.

[Ted Opitz, Conservative, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you very much, witnesses, for being here today. I believe in what you're doing, quite frankly, because I know that animals have tremendous therapeutic value. I've had animals my whole life. In fact, my mother is something of a Dr. Dolittle, because everything seems to find her and she seems to nurse them all back to health.

In fact, our chair himself seems to be something of a horseman, so he understands that. He was telling me that his best buddy is a horse, and that makes sense.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

If you look around the table, you can see that the people who are the most balanced are the ones who spend time with horses.

[Ted Opitz, Conservative, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

There you go. That explains why I've been thrown off a few horses.

But it is a good thing, because there are other programs involving other animals, such as the dolphins they use in particular with autistic kids. Of course a lot of groups, St. John Ambulance and others, use therapy dogs and cats in long-term care facilities for seniors. There's very much therapeutic value there, and I see that.

As the colonel just said, the Canadian Forces is not averse to this. The U.S. will do its study—of course we're allies, and we do trade these studies back and forth—and they will examine that. I'm not seeing any resistance to it; I'm just saying that, you know, we have to follow the process. Some evidence-based stuff has to happen. But I'm confident that at some point, with Wounded Warriors and others, you'll probably find some traction down the road.

So I applaud what you're doing. It makes sense. I know it's had a lot of value for a lot of people having different injuries, not necessarily operational stress injuries...like soldiers, which sometimes is a specific thing.

Colonel, with my soldiers I used to try very hard to ensure that they self-identified as often as possible. Sometimes they'll have traumatic injuries, and the issue is that you'll never find a soldier sitting around singing Kumbaya. But you will see them sitting around sharing experiences with one another. They'll do that only because it's only another soldier who can really understand it, especially if they've shared those sorts of experiences.

Having said that, part of that is educating your soldiers, the public, and most importantly the families. Families have to be educated. I know with pre- and post-deployment briefings the families are brought into the loop. They understand what to look for and to check for mental illnesses being able to manifest themselves. Sometimes it happens insidiously over time, and there are small changes to the personality of the soldier that only his buddies, oftentimes, can detect and pick up.

Sir, could you expand on what programs are available right now to families of the Canadian Forces who are dealing with operational stress injuries of a family member, or other mental illnesses?

[Col Scott McLeod]

Absolutely. That's a very enlightened question and lead-on there. It's clear that you have a good understanding of the importance of family in looking after our soldiers.

We have a broad variety of different approaches to this. As you mentioned, our education, using Road to Mental Readiness, is a big part of that in educating our family members in not only how to recognize the symptoms but also how to deal with some of their own symptoms that come up when they're dealing with a partner who's suffering with PTSD. They're also encouraged to participate, where possible, in the care of that individual within our own mental health clinics.

Our military family resource centres are available to people as well, for our family members, and they can have access to services through the MFRC. We also have the Canadian Forces member assistance program, which is the 1-800 number that they can call to get counselling services.

It's very complex. We try to approach it in many different ways. The key is the education and being available to help them be a part of that healing process as well. The family is extremely important in the healing process.

[Ted Opitz, Conservative, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

How do you deal with the issue of stigma? I know for a lot of my soldiers, the problem was that they would associate that with being weak. You're not trained to be that, and you don't want to show weakness. You also think that you won't be operationally effective or deployable later on. That's a career limitation that they're afraid of, clearly, which will affect their treatment.

What programs are specifically in place to deal with the issue of stigma? And this is amongst commanders, too, by the way, not just those who are affected by mental illness.

[Col Scott McLeod]

That's really where the Road to Mental Readiness training program is in all of our leadership stages in the Canadian Forces. We've now integrated that into professional development for military members so that they understand what mental health is. Road to Mental Readiness is not just about building resiliency but also educating people on what mental illness is in Canada, as well as in the military, specifically related to operational stress injuries. That is available throughout.

Be the Difference is a program that was started by General Natynczyk. Now we're starting to work with the Mental Health Commission of Canada to see how we can approach stigma in Canada in general. Just identifying post-traumatic stress disorder and illnesses like that as injuries that occur as a result of combat has certainly improved in terms of the stigma as well, because they can relate to a mental health “injury” easier than they can to a mental health “illness”.

I hope that answers your question.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

The time has expired.

Ms. Moore, you have five minutes.

[Christine Moore, NDP, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Thank you very much.

My questions are chiefly for colonel McLeod.

I would like to talk more specifically about mental health care provided to reservists. Many of them served in places such as Afghanistan. Many are from reserve regiments that are in large urban centres, but many of the regiments are located outside these centres.

How can we ensure that these people have access to good mental health care when they return to civilian life? They do continue to be reservists. However, it is true that they have less access to these services than do other members of the military.

[Col Scott McLeod]

The translation isn't working, but I believe the question is specifically related to access to mental health care for our reserve force when they return from deployment.

The reservists who return from deployment and are suffering with a mental health injury have the same access to care as a regular force member. They get the same post-deployment enhanced screening to look for mental illness, and they have the same access to the same services.

I have to find out how to get this working....

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Channel 2 has the English interpretation.

[Christine Moore, NDP, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Is it currently working?

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Are neither of you getting interpretation? Continue speaking on channel 2 until we get it working.

Alison, do you have it?

[Alison Vandergragt]

I believe so.

[Christine Moore, NDP, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

I would like to come back to one point. I understand that reservists have access to the same services and the same care. Still, reservists who served in Afghanistan and live in Rouyn-Noranda have to drive six hours to get to a specialist. They have access to the same services, but they will have to lose three days every time they want to go see a specialist.

What kind of services will you provide these people who, when they return to civilian life, find themselves in remote regions where there are practically no specialists? There are perhaps three or four psychiatrists for that entire region and they are already overwhelmed by the number of civilian patients.

How do you ensure that you are providing good care to these people when they live in remote areas?

[Col Scott McLeod]

That's a very good question. That's a very difficult thing to deal with. We understand that.

With regard to anybody who has returned from Afghanistan or from any deployment and may be suffering from a mental health illness, we certainly encourage them to come to one of our facilities for assessment and treatment. We have high-quality experts who deal with operational trauma and mental health injuries. We also use the Veterans Affairs clinics as well. For people who are in extremely remote areas and need specialist care, there are ways of getting them the transport required to get that specialized care.

We're also looking at using advanced telemedicine as an option. If we can connect people in remote communities with our specialty clinics, even through remote telemedicine, that will help us. As remote telemedicine starts improving throughout the country, we start improving that as well. We're also looking at other forms of social media to at least get people in to start accessing their care.

[Christine Moore, NDP, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Are they compensated for the hours they lose at their civilian jobs when they have to travel for their treatment? If they have to lose three days of work to receive care, are they compensated for the salary they lose to have access to that care?

[Col Scott McLeod]

That's a good question. Offhand, I don't know the answer to exactly how we manage that. If they are still reservists, they would be considered on duty for that time, and they would be getting class A reserve pay for that time.

If they're now out of the military, they would be falling under the responsibility of Veterans Affairs.

[Christine Moore, NDP, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

They also have a civilian job from which they will have to be away. I would ask that you obtain this information and send me an answer because I find this very worrisome. Reservists who have completed their mission and live in remote areas have to make a difficult choice: either they travel to receive care elsewhere or they try to make do with the services provided in their area, at the risk of not receiving the care they need. I imagine the same goes for their families. For example, spouses who want to support their spouses will also have to travel.

In your opinion, are there any problems that need to be fixed? Because these are not regular cases, data is difficult to obtain.

[Col Scott McLeod]

There are a couple of points.

First, if people are still serving and are reservists, they would be paid as reservists for the time they come for care. So there is some form of reimbursement. If not, it would be Veterans Affairs.

I believe where you were going is that there is a gap in the system. We'd be the first to admit that there is no perfect mental health care system anywhere in Canada. We recognize the challenge for our remote personnel. We're currently trying to work on every way possible to get that care to those people, because they deserve high-quality mental health care. We are finding as many ways as we can to do that. It may be through local contractors. But as you point out, in some of these locations, it's extremely difficult to do that.