BC Boosts Child Mental Health Workers

By 250 News

Mental health is the number one health concern affecting children and youth.  With that fact firmly in mind, the provincial government has announced plans to increase the number of child and youth mental health workers across B.C. by nearly 15-percent this year.

And the Children and Family Development Ministry has just launched a provincial, national and international recruitment campaign aimed at fulfilling that promise by hiring 75 professionals, including: psychologists, nurses, psychiatric nurses, counsellors and clinical social workers.  It's expected 35 of these new hires will be able to offer culturally-relevant services to Aboriginal children and families.

Minister Tom Christensen says since introducing the Child and Youth Mental Health Plan in 2003, more than 200 health specialists have been hired to bolster the number of ministry-funded clinicians to 530 in total.

"Recruiting from a specialized field is usually a huge challenge, but the fact B.C. has a plan that is clearly improving services for children and their families is a strong draw for professionals to the ministry and to this province," says Christensen.

Public Affairs Officer Karen Murry says it's too early to say how many of these new mental health worker positions will be in the Prince George region.  But she says 54 of the the existing 530 positions are in the North.  Murry says the hiring process is expected to begin as early as mid-June through to the fall.

According to Ministry estimates, it's believed that at least one in seven children is impacted by  mental disorders, the most common being anxiety disorder and depression.

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