Wednesday, February 18, 2004

Annual Report of the Office of the Provincial Auditor of Ontario: Children’s Mental Health Services
This report (in Adobe Acrobat format) is available at the Open Minds web site. The report notes that "Our audit objectives were to assess whether the Ministry’s administrative procedures were adequate to ensure that: the quality and outcome of services provided by the community-based agencies wasmonitored and assessed; and that transfer payments to agencies were reasonable and satisfactorily controlled. The scope of our audit included a review and analyses of ministry files and administrativeprocedures, as well as interviews with appropriate staff at the Ministry’s head office and threeregional offices. We also visited a number of agency sites and interviewed staff there..."  
  

Antidepressants found ineffective on teenagers (Canada)
Story in the Globe and Mail (Toronto) - "Widely used antidepressant drugs prescribed to tens of thousands of Canadian teens and children are barely more effective than placebos in treating adolescent depression, according to a leading Canadian expert in the field. The assertion by psychiatrist Jane Garland follows a recent cascade of critical information questioning the risk and effectiveness of prescribing antidepressant medication for troubled young patients..." See also Garland's article in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, Facing the evidence: antidepressant treatment in children and adolescents (also available in Adobe Acrobat format).   
  

Mental health issues said to cost economy $33 billion a year (Canada)
Vancouver Sun story - "Mental health is the leading cause of worker disability and it is striking the most productive members of the labour force, according to key business leaders who met Tuesday to warn corporate directors that they ignore the problem at their peril. The Global Business and Economic Roundtable on Addiction and Mental Health issued its Board of Directors Guideline on Mental Health and Safety, an initiative spearheaded by John Evans, a physician and chairman of the board at Torstar Corporation."