Paper
Friday, July 13, 2007
Promoting Mental Health and Resilience in Street-Involved Youth
Elizabeth McCay, RN, PhD1, Linda Cooper, RN, PhD2, Heather Beanlands, RN, PhD3, John Langley, MD4, Patricia Robinson, RN, MEd5, Naomi Mudachi, RN3, Marianne Rigatti, RN3, Sutra Parmasad, BA3, Carol Howes, MSW6, Karen Bach, BA, MPsych7, Colin Dart, MSW8, and Susan Miner9. (1) School of Nursing, Ryerson University, Toronto, ON, Canada, (2) Ryerson University, Toronto, ON, Canada, (3) School of Nursing, Ryerson University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, (4) Department of Psychiatry, University of Toronto and St. Michael's Hospital, Toronto, ON, Canada, (5) School of Nursing, George Brown College, Toronto, ON, Canada, (6) Covenant House, Residential Outreach Programs, Toronto, ON, Canada, (7) Yonge Street Mission’s Evergreen Centre for Street Youth, Yonge Street Mission’s Evergreen Centre for Street Youth, Toronto, ON, Canada, (8) Turning Point Youth Services, Turning Point Youth Services, Toronto, ON, Canada, (9) Street Outreach Services, Street Outreach Services, Toronto, ON, Canada
| Learning Objective #1: better understand the mental health needs of street-involved youth based on a comprehensive assessment using qualitative, participatory action and quantitative methods. |
| Learning Objective #2: understand how the study results guide the participatory action component of the study and the development of youth specific mental health policy recommendations. |
For youth living on the street, mental illness may be either a major risk factor for homelessness or may frequently emerge in response to coping with the multitudinous stressors associated with homelessness. This paper reports on a comprehensive assessment of mental health need of homeless youth using mixed methodology (qualitative, participatory action and quantitative methods). A purposive sample of 65 subjects, ages 16 to 24, has been recruited from 4 community agencies Covenant House, Evergreen Centre for Street Youth, Turning Point and Street Outreach Services in Toronto. Youth had been living on the street or in short –term residential programs for a minimum of 1 month prior to their participation. Our group also conducted 8 qualitative interviews with a subset of the sample. The preliminary results indicate that these youth have profoundly high levels of mental health symptoms; including depression, anxiety, psychoticism, interpersonal sensitivity and increased hopelessness. Nearly two thirds of the participants have experienced physical abuse, while one quarter has been sexually abused, and 27% expressed some form of suicidal ideation. Just less than one half of the participants have engaged in some form of self harm and virtually all engage in some form of substance abuse. Further these young adults have considerably lower quality of life scores compared to Ontario high school students. Paradoxically, in spite of high levels of mental health symptoms, high levels of self esteem and resilience were observed.Without exception, these participants identified the centrality of supportive relationships in becoming mentally healthy and strong. The results from this study suggest that providing opportunities to build on strengths offers potential to improve mental health symptoms and overall quality of life. The results are being used to guide the participatory action component of the study which will guide our recommendations for youth specific mental health policy.