Grant: Operating Grant: Programmatic Grants to tackle health and health equity - LOI

Mental health and addictions problems are leading causes of disability. Evidence shows significant differences in the mental health of immigrant, refugee, ethnocultural and racialised (IRER) groups when compared to other people in Canada. The general path is for worsening mental health and higher rates of mental illness, suicide and substance misuse the longer groups have been in Canada. IRER groups do not receive an equitable response to their needs from health systems. Health promotion and illness prevention initiatives may not be as effective in these groups. The Mental Health Commission of Canada has published a vision for a transformed mental health system. A major focus is the move towards prevention and health promotion and away from simply producing more mental health services. This offers an opportunity to decrease the rates of mental illness in IRER groups and bring them down to that of others in Canada. But for this to happen we need better information on what prevention and health promotion strategies are effective in IRER groups We propose a program of research into the prevention of mental illness and the promotion of mental health in IRER groups in Canada. We plan to build the evidence on risk and protective factors for mental health problems and illnesses in IRER groups in Canada as well as identifying which prevention and health promotion strategies are effective. We will develop a method for adapting mainstream initiatives to meet the needs of IRER groups and investigate how to facilitate such initiatives being taken up by policy makers and communities. At present no single centre in Canada contains the expertise for this ambitious undertaking. We will develop a virtual centre including leading academic departments, policy makers and community workers across Canada. We will ensure that the perspective of both communities and policy makers instruct what happens in the research so that our findings are more likely to be used.