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Health committee Good morning, and thank you for inviting me to speak to you. My name is Wendy Digout, and I am a psychologist based out of Antigonish. I work in my own private practice in rural Nova Scotia, and I am also an associate with Hexagon Psychology. Working in private practice, but al
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout
Health committee Thank you for the question. It's interesting when you talk about Fort McMurray, because I think we have several families that go back and forth between our communities, so there's a whole other family issue of one parent often working away. Locally, our Nova Scotia government h
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout
Health committee I think they end up seeing someone like Dr. Black. If we can catch the issues early enough, both within the family and for the child specifically, because they don't live in a silo, so the parents and family also need support.... When we don't have access to services for our chi
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout
Health committee I'll go ahead. I think it goes back to early access. When it comes to drug use with teens, they're getting education within the school, but I don't think they often hear it. I think they need more real-life experience type of learning and hearing from people who have experience.
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout
Health committee I agree with Dr. Black in that what we're seeing with the wait times is that things aren't being well managed. I think our government is trying hard to look at alternatives. One issue I'm seeing in colleagues, both within the formal mental health system in the hospital system and
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout
Health committee I concur.
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout
Health committee I don't know the exact research studies, but I'm sure they're out there. I think that even just common sense.... I have families who have to make a decision on whether they can afford to take the afternoon off work to take their kid to therapy, or whether or not they can afford t
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout
Health committee I would agree that many of my clients are continuing to request virtual. Some kids are just more comfortable with the screen as well, which I think is important when we're doing assessments and working with kids. I don't know, in terms of the formal systems, whether or not they
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout
Health committee I think food security is an issue in all communities. I think it's probably worse in remote communities like yours, where it's much more expensive. I go back to the idea that a calorie is an energy unit. We need to provide kids with energy and the nutrients they need to grow. T
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout
Health committee Again, there's tons of research on this. We do know the importance of getting out and being active. I think for some of our neurodiverse clients it's even more important to be able to get out, get active and get moving.
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout
Health committee I don't really. I often go to the U.K. psychological.... I can't remember the name of the website. I continually look at their standards, and there are a few programs in the U.K. that I often turn to when I'm looking for ideas for things. However, I really don't know much about
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout
Health committee Many teachers do. Certainly, Senator Kutcher has done a lot of work, working with schools in Nova Scotia. He's set up some great programming for teachers to learn about mental health and the language around mental health. It's coming. I think it's a matter where some teachers a
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout
Health committee The only other thing I would add is that in the neurodiverse community, there are often some difficulties around performing even daily oral care because of sensory issues. I think it's a really important role for mental health clinicians, and occupational therapists particularly,
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout
Health committee I agree with Dr. Black that the harm reduction philosophy is kind of.... I guess that's the standard with which we have to start, but we don't have enough treatment facilities when they are required. With regard to harm reduction, there's actually a very specific way to use harm
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout
Health committee I know that there's currently debate in Nova Scotia around how to make that work, because our government is strongly looking at a way of billing private practitioners. On the difference between clients who have private health insurance, who I can direct bill, compared with the pe
November 3rd, 2022Committee meeting
Wendy Digout