2026 Agenda

Creating a mentally healthy Canada requires leadership that extends beyond healthcare — it demands collaboration across sectors, communities, and systems. In this session, Marion shares her vision for transforming mental health from an illness-focused system to a wellbeing-centered movement.

Drawing on decades of experience in community mental health, policy development, and system innovation, Marion will explore how leaders can drive meaningful change through partnership, equity, and innovation. Attendees will gain practical insights into how to embed mental health promotion and prevention into every level of society — from workplaces and schools to healthcare and policy.

Key Session Takeaways Include:

• Discover how cross-sector collaboration can advance mental health and wellbeing across systems and communities.
• Learn actionable strategies to promote mental wellbeing and resilience as core priorities in programs and policies.
• Understand how inclusive leadership and innovative approaches can create lasting, system-wide mental health improvements.

This session will showcase practical, evidence-based tools and programs that make mental health a lived reality in workplaces and healthcare environments. Through partnerships across Canada, the Mental Health Commission of Canada (MHCC) has developed accessible resources that address clinical capacity, system barriers, and workforce wellbeing.

The speaker will highlight real-world examples of digital platforms, training modules, and scalable interventions that are making an impact today. This includes free online training on suicide prevention, groundbreaking e-learning on structural stigma, as well as training and tools to change negative attitudes and reduce stigma related to mental illness. She’ll demonstrate how organizations are integrating these resources into care delivery and staff support and explore how MHCC’s collaborative approach to building shared infrastructure is now being applied to digital mental health innovation, including frameworks for responsible AI use and data-driven system intelligence.

Key Session Takeaways Include:

• Discover free, evidence-based resources and training programs for building clinical capacity, addressing structural barriers, and supporting workforce wellbeing
• See real examples of how organizations are using digital platforms, training modules, and scalable interventions to embed mental health into daily operations
• Learn about emerging frameworks for digital innovation that can extend reach while maintaining quality and equity

Cross-sector collaboration is transforming how communities support recovery and long-term wellness. This session explores how partnerships among mental health hospitals, supportive housing providers, and community-based organizations are redefining the continuum of care. Drawing from real-world initiatives led by The Royal, Salus Ottawa, and Matthew Perry House, the panel will showcase how integrating housing, clinical care, and social supports can improve mental health outcomes and system performance. Participants will gain insights into models that blend evidence-based practice with lived experience to advance recovery, dignity, and inclusion across Canada’s mental health landscape.

Key Session Takeaways Include:

• Understand how hospitals, housing organizations, and community programs can align strategies, funding, and outcomes to deliver coordinated recovery care.
• Explore how supportive housing models like Matthew Perry House and Salus Ottawa foster stability, dignity, and sustained mental health recovery.
• Learn how organizations like The Royal are driving research-informed, partnership-based innovation to advance Canada’s mental health agenda.
• Discover how embedding client and family perspectives in program design leads to more effective, equitable, and person-centered mental health systems.

In a complex and often fragmented mental health and substance use health landscape, collaboration can feel out of reach. This session explores how ecosystem design — a structured, relationship-driven approach to aligning systems and stakeholders — can help leaders move beyond silos toward shared purpose and collective impact.

Drawing on national and provincial initiatives, Shauna Cronin from Stepped Care Solutions will illustrate how organizations can bridge policy, practice, and lived experience to create unified systems of care. Attendees will learn practical methods to foster alignment across diverse partners, break down barriers, and build a cohesive mental health ecosystem that truly meets people where they are.

Key Session Takeaways Include:

• Learn how ecosystem design principles can bridge divides and align mental health and substance use systems.
• Explore practical tools and frameworks that promote coordination, communication, and shared accountability.
• Gain insight into how leaders can cultivate relationships, trust, and synergy to drive transformation in complex health environments.

Indigenous approaches to mental health are wholistic — integrating spirit, heart, mind and body while recognizing the connectedness of family, community and nationhood. This session, led by Shkaabe Makwa at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH), explores how First Nations, Inuit, and Métis models of wellness are grounded in traditional healing practices and community strengths.

Participants will learn how these approaches promote balance, identity, and belonging, while addressing the ongoing impacts of colonization and intergenerational trauma. The session will highlight how organizations can respectfully integrate Indigenous knowledge and partnerships into mental health systems to create more equitable and culturally safe care for all.

Key Session Takeaways Include:

• Gain insight into how traditional healing practices — including ceremony, connection to land, and community-based approaches — form the foundation of Indigenous mental health.
• Learn strategies to embed Indigenous knowledge and leadership into mental health systems, policies, and services in ways that promote equity and reconciliation.
• Discover how partnerships with Indigenous communities can strengthen mental health promotion, early intervention, and recovery across diverse settings.

Children’s Mental Health organizations face the challenge of driving transformation without being the primary health authority.  At CASA Mental Health, we’ve embraced this challenge by leading our people through change while building a more connected, responsive system of care for children, adolescents, and their families in Alberta.  This workshop would share CASA’s journey of growth and innovation: how do we build and scale new services while continuing to deliver high-quality care in current operations.  From a Clinical Leadership perspective: guiding our teams through uncertainty, balancing innovation with stability, and ensuring staff remain supported while driving system level changes.

Key Takeaways:

• Examine leadership strategies for scaling services while sustaining quality in existing operations.
• Identify approaches for supporting staff through uncertainty and change
• Apply CASA’s lessons in innovation, resilience, and partnership with health authorities to their own leadership contexts.

Across mental health services worldwide, the use of restrictive practices remains one of the most complex clinical and ethical challenges. While managing risk is sometimes unavoidable, the way we support people in moments of crisis can and must continue to improve.

This session introduces an innovative, evidence-based approach that is transforming how services respond to high-risk situations. The Safety Pod offers a practical, dignified alternative to traditional physical intervention methods helping organisations reduce restrictive practices while promoting safety, comfort, and therapeutic engagement.

Discover how environments can become safer and more compassionate for both service users and professionals. The session will also provide an overview of the new SPI-Instructor Support Platform designed to equip teams globally with the skills, knowledge, and confidence to embed least restrictive practice into everyday training.

Key Session Takeaways:

• Gain insight into the global journey of reducing restrictive practice and the evidence-led development of the Safety Pod.
• Understand how innovation, co-production, and real-world learning shaped a practical solution now used globally.
• Discover the new online education platform and how it supports consistent, ethical, and confident least restrictive practice worldwide.

This presentation will showcase a mental health hospital’s approach to innovation. Featuring case studies and provincially led projects, participants will learn how Ontario Shores Centre for Mental Health Sciences optimized innovation and technology to advance clinical care and improve the patient experience. Ontario Shores has been recognized as an international leader in digital transformation and will share its experiences of fostering a culture of innovation throughout the organization.

Key Takeaways:

• How to engage frontline staff and build a culture of innovation
• The integration of online tools and predictive analytics to improve patient outcomes
• The use of pharmacogenomics to enhance medication effectiveness

The Independent Rights Advice Service (IRAS) provides neutral and unbiased education and support to people who are detained under the Mental Health Act of British Columbia. The service has been newly integrated into the involuntary treatment admissions process and recently enshrined into law as a statutory right of patients and is staffed by Rights Advisors with lived and living experience of mental illness, substance use, and involuntary treatment.

Independent of involuntary care facilities or patient care teams, IRAS provides patients with trauma-informed and culturally safe(r) education on the statutory rights they possess and the avenues through which those rights can be exercised. Through the integration of experiential leadership and rights-based education, IRAS seeks to enhance equity, human rights and hope for the most vulnerable patients navigating the BC mental healthcare system.

Key Takeaways:

• Highlight the impact of Rights Advice services on patient wellbeing, equity, and quality improvement across jurisdictions.
• Showcase the role of lived experience in shaping and leading the Independent Rights Advice Service.
• Share strategies for implementing change in healthcare settings resistant to rights-based approaches.

Transitions from hospital to home are often the most vulnerable stage in the recovery journey for patients living with mental health conditions. Fragmented communication, unclear accountability, and limited timely post-discharge support frequently led to readmissions and hinder sustained recovery. To address these gaps, Waypoint Centre for Mental Health Care and Bayshore Integrated Care Solutions partnered over one year ago, to co-design and implement an integrated Hospital-to-Home (H2H) program that bridges mental health care with coordinated and timely in-home care services – the first mental health focused H2H program in Ontario. This innovative program emphasizes shared care

planning, interdisciplinary collaboration, and continuity of care through joint hospital-homecare teams. This session will provide an overview of the program’s design and implementation process, highlight early evaluation findings, and share practical lessons learned in building an integrated model across two distinct healthcare settings.

Key Session Takeaways Include:

• Explore the design and implementation of an integrated mental health focused H2H program, including strategies for shared care planning, interdisciplinary collaboration, and continuity of care across hospital and homecare sectors.
• Identify practical lessons and review early evaluation findings from the H2H initiative, with a focus on how coordinated care models can reduce readmissions and improve long-term recovery for patients living with mental health conditions.

Innovation in mental health thrives when clinical expertise, digital solutions, and system partnerships come together. This panel brings diverse perspectives from hospital leadership, research, and international collaboration to explore how technology and teamwork are transforming mental health services.

Featuring leaders from Montfort Hospital, and the eMental Health International Collaborative (eMHIC), the discussion will highlight how organizations are integrating evidence-based digital tools, fostering innovation cultures, and improving patient outcomes through collaboration. Attendees will gain insight into practical strategies for bridging clinical care and digital innovation to create more accessible, equitable, and effective mental health systems.

Key Session Takeaways Include:

• Learn how partnerships across clinical, research, and digital sectors drive sustainable innovation in mental health care.
• Explore how technology and data can complement traditional care to enhance access, quality, and patient experience.
• Understand the leadership and organizational practices that foster collaboration, creativity, and continuous improvement.