In response to the Auditor General's report, and to continually improve services for women under our care, we revamped our computerized mental health screening system so that we can ensure that we are flagging the women with the most significant needs. This includes women who were hospitalized just before incarceration, who were recently diagnosed, or who have lifetime history of suicide attempts or self-injury. We've just recently rolled out a new scoring approach to the computerized mental health screening model so that we can target early interventions, because we know that identifying and treating mental illness early leads to better results, both from a health perspective and from a correctional outcome perspective.
In addition, we are in the early stages of identifying pathways of care for various offenders, men and women, so that we can ensure we are matching the right service with the intensity that the individual requires. This would ensure a continuity of care between institutions for men and women.
To add to Commissioner Kelly's response, the additional capacity for intermediate mental health care for maximum security women will allow us to better address their mental health needs, close to their communities, close to their family supports, and without disrupting their correctional plan for a transfer to either an outside hospital or to the Regional Psychiatric Centre in the Prairies. Certainly, if you need hospital care, that hospital care is available. However, being able to provide intensive outpatient care, which is essentially what intermediate mental health care is, at the women's home facility really does allow for that continuity with their community relations and with their correctional plan.