Veterans Affairs committee  The counsellor will evaluate the situation and ask questions on the level of stress, the suicidal thoughts, and ideation. Also, the counsellor will spend whatever time is necessary with the person over the phone before that person is referred to a mental health professional or ot

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes.

Veterans Affairs committee  A mental health professional answers the phone. There is no answering machine that welcomes the client. It's a live person.

Veterans Affairs committee  When the client sees one of our counsellors, the counsellor provides a voluntary survey with questions regarding the services that the client has received. They provide the person with a pre-stamped envelope as well, so the person can send us the information, which is then shared

Veterans Affairs committee  Normally, a session is one hour.

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes.

Veterans Affairs committee  That's right. There needs to be an intervention that is provided to the client. Based on the intervention needed, the amount of sessions is decided.

Veterans Affairs committee  They will identify themself as either a veteran or former military member.

Veterans Affairs committee  Most of the time, yes, but if they can't or if they've just heard about us and don't know if they qualify for the service, we will ask questions of the person as to whether they have military life experience and if, at that point, they are regular members or former military.

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes. I think....

Veterans Affairs committee  No. At this time, there's no way to do so because it would be very difficult to assess the person's condition and to get back in touch with the person. For the moment, the safest method is for the person to call the 1-800 number. A mental health professional will respond and imme

Veterans Affairs committee  We would refer to existing resources, for example OSISS. We work closely with them as well. If a veteran needed to speak with a peer, then we would use the services already in place.

Veterans Affairs committee  Maybe not within the hour, but we would certainly make the call right away, and we would either stay on the phone with this person or we would do frequent follow-ups during the evening. We would find out the best way to support this person at that time.

Veterans Affairs committee  It's never happened.

Veterans Affairs committee  We have actually hired more mental health professionals.