$500,000 donation grows Bell's support for mental health care access in
Québec
MONTREAL, Jan. 26, 2015 /CNW Telbec/ - CHU Sainte-Justine and Bell today
announced a gift of $500,000 from Bell Let's Talk to support Québec's
first Integrated Mother-Child Centre for Eating Disorders.
Eating disorders: A steadily growing problem among children and teens in
Quebec
Over the past four years, the number of young patients admitted to
Sainte-Justine for an eating disorder has increased by 44%, from 83 to
120 hospitalizations per year. Sainte-Justine treats the highest
proportion of hospitalized patients with eating disorders in Québec,
75% of whom are referred to the hospital from outside the Montréal
area.
"This is a project of paramount importance for Québec," said Dr. Fabrice
Brunet, Chief Executive Officer of CHU Sainte-Justine. "Sainte-Justine
has been a leader in the field of eating disorders for more than 30
years. With Bell's support, we will further expand the solutions
available to address a problem that is increasing at an alarming rate,
and work with our partners across the province to reach out to hundreds
of families in order to ensure their children can benefit from services
that are among the best in the world."
The contribution from Bell Let's Talk will help CHU Sainte-Justine move
forward with the first step in the development of this integrated
facility, the opening of a day hospital that will provide an
intermediate level of care between full hospitalization and outpatient
services. This new approach will ensure a more targeted and
personalized level of intervention for young patients and their
families in an effort to decrease the number and duration of hospital
stays and offer enhanced support for families as youth reintegrate to
normal living. Ultimately, the day hospital will help prevent the
development of eating disorders, reduce their length and improve
patients' overall prognosis.
"We are very pleased to partner with CHU Sainte-Justine to support
Québec's first Integrated Mother-Child Centre for Eating Disorders.
This key centre will address a critical need for increased access to
care for young people with serious eating disorders and much-needed
support for their families, not only in the Montréal area but across
the province," said Martine Turcotte, Vice Chair Québec at Bell. "Bell
Let's Talk's has committed approximately $27 million to expanding care
options and driving new research in mental health care in Québec, along
with ending the stigma of mental illness. We are proud to support CHU
Sainte-Justine and many other hospitals and institutions all across
Québec in the tremendous work they are doing."
Concrete solutions to meet an urgent need
The new centre will serve as a referral facility and a comprehensive,
specialized platform for the diagnosis, treatment and support of
patients aged 6 to 18 with eating disorders, as well as young
mothers-to-be. It will also help advance teaching and research in this
field. Eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of all mental
illnesses amongst young people. The disease affects school, work and
social life and is associated with serious medical consequences and
other psychiatric disorders.
"The challenges before us are great," said Dr. Danielle Taddeo, a
pediatrician and the head of adolescent medicine at Sainte-Justine's
Department of Pediatrics and the co-director of the integrated centre.
"This new facility will enable us to consolidate our expertise in a
single location and bring the necessary resources together to overcome
these challenges."
"In the short term, we will also strive to better align the care
provided by the adolescent medicine and psychiatric units, adapt our
services to the growing number of youths aged 18 and younger with an
eating disorder, promote the optimal continuity of care and facilitate
the transition toward adult services," added Dr. Pierre-Olivier Nadeau,
a child and adolescent psychiatrist in Sainte-Justine's Department of
Psychiatry and the centre's other co-director.
The donation from Bell Let's Talk is part of the CHU Sainte-Justine
Foundation's Healing More Better campaign, ongoing until 2018.
"We are fortunate to be able to count on Bell's invaluable support and
major commitment to this ambitious, forward-looking initiative aimed at
continuously improving the health of our children," concluded Maud
Cohen, President and Executive Director of the CHU Sainte-Justine
Foundation.
Bell Let's Talk Day is January 28
On January 28, for every text message, wireless and long distance call
made by Bell Canada and Bell Aliant customers, every tweet using
#BellLetsTalk, and every Facebook share of that day's Bell Let's Talk
Day image at Facebook.com/BellLetsTalk, Bell will donate 5 cents more to Canadian mental health programs.
In 2014, Canadians answered the call with a total of 109,451,718
messages including texts, wireless and long distance calls, tweets and
Facebook shares, meaning Bell added another $5,472,585.90 to its Bell
Let's Talk funding commitment. Based on its original $50 million
donation and the results of the last 4 Bell Let's Talk Days, Bell has
now committed more than $67.5 million to Canadian mental health.
Bell's donations are made at no extra charge to Bell Let's Talk Day
participants, though normal long distance or text charges, if any,
apply.
The Bell Let's Talk mental health initiative
Bell Let's Talk promotes mental health based on 4 action pillars -
anti-stigma, care and access, research, and workplace best practices.
The initiative supports mental health leaders across the country
including l'Institut universitaire en santé mentale de Montréal,
Hôpital Charles-LeMoyne, Montreal Jewish Hospital, the Douglas Mental
Health University Institute, La Fondation du Centre hospitalier
universitaire de Québec, Concordia University, Université Laval
Foundation, CHU Sainte-Justine, the Royal Ottawa Hospital, the Centre
for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH), the University of British
Columbia, Queen's University, Brain Canada, Kids Help Phone, Sunnybrook
Hospital and Vancouver General Hospital.
The annual Bell Let's Talk Community Fund supports front-line mental
health organizations in every region of the country. The Fund has
provided grants of $5,000 to $50,000 to hundreds of community
organizations focused on improving access to programs and services that
support people living with mental health issues.
To learn more about the Bell Let's Talk campaign, and to download the
Bell Let's Talk toolkit to help get the conversation started, please
visit Bell.ca/LetsTalk
About Bell
Bell is Canada's largest communications company, providing consumers and
business customers with wireless, TV, Internet, home phone and business
communications services. Bell Media is Canada's premier multimedia
company with leading assets in television, radio, out of home, and
digital media. Bell is wholly owned by Montréal's BCE Inc. (TSX, NYSE:
BCE). For more information, please visit Bell.ca
About CHU Sainte-Justine
The Sainte-Justine university hospital centre (CHU Sainte-Justine) is
the largest mother-child centre in Canada and the second largest
pediatric hospital in North America. A member of the Université de
Montréal extended network of excellence in health (RUIS),
Sainte-Justine has 5,664 employees, including 1,578 nurses and nursing
assistants; 1,117 other healthcare professionals; 502 physicians,
dentists and pharmacists; 822 residents; and more than 200 researchers,
300 volunteers and 3,400 interns and students in a wide range of
disciplines. Sainte-Justine has 484 beds, including 35 at the Centre de
réadaptation Marie Enfant, the only exclusively pediatric
rehabilitation centre in Quebec. The World Health Organization has
recognized CHU Sainte-Justine as a "health promoting hospital." chusj.org
About the CHU Sainte-Justine Foundation
The Foundation's mission is to engage the community and support CHU
Sainte-Justine in its commitment to developing better ways to heal more
children in Quebec and provide them with one of the highest levels of
healthcare in the world. www.fondation-sainte-justine.org.
SOURCE Bell Canada
