Thursday June 16

3:15pm – 4:45pm

Concurrent Sessions

T9: PM
Title: Seniors and Crisis: Perspectives, Practical Approaches and Partnerships at the Client, Agency and Community Level
Format: Community Sound Bite Panel
Presenters: Julia Baxter, Manager Seniors Mental Health Outreach Programs, St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton, Kathy Peters, Strategic Lead, Behavioural Supports Ontario (BSO) HNHB LHIN, Keith Jim (Burlington) and Alissa Milani (Hamilton), members of BSO Community Outreach Teams, HNHB LHIN

Seniors, young old to the old old, are a fast growing population in our communities. In this session we will explore crisis situations involving seniors and the factors that bring a uniqueness and specialty to this work. Through a range of workshop modalities we will highlight practical tools and approaches of doing good crisis work from the perspective of the senior/family to the system.

Learning Objectives:

1. Participants will gain a better awareness and understanding of the unique factors that contribute to or influence crisis situations involving seniors.
2. Participants will be exposed to a range of practical ideas at the client, organization and community level so as to strengthen crisis prevention and intervention involving seniors.
3. Participants will be challenged to consider how to enhance their crisis skills related to growing demographic.

T10: PM
Title: Resiliency – The Power or Ability to Return to the Original Form
Format: Workshop
Presenter: Robert Tansley MSW/RSW, Clinical Manager, Reach Out Centre for Kids (ROCK)

A crisis is the absence of coping skills. It is that moment where one doesn’t know what to do next. In that moment you are vulnerable to making a poor choice, an error in judgment. Bad things are going to happen. The question then becomes, how does one recover? How does one return to the original state? Resiliency exists at three levels; individual; family and community. This workshop is focused on how to create resiliency at the three levels.

Learning Objectives:

1. Participants will learn how to build and sustain resiliency.
2. Participants will learn about the role of risk in resiliency.
3. Participants will lean how to respond to crisis such that healing in promoted.

T11: PM
Title: Creating Psychologically Healthy and Safe Workplaces
Format: Presentation
Presenter: Denis Oliver, Public Educator – Canadian Mental Health Association Halton Region Branch

We will present what contributes to psychologically healthy and safe workplaces, the benefits to individuals, companies, and organizations, and what employers and employees can do to build and maintain positive and supportive work environments. Specific topics will include dealing with difficult people, having challenging conversations, and supporting people experiencing mental health and/or addiction concerns at work.

Learning objectives:

1. Participants will learn how to identify what contributes to psychological health and safety at work.
2. Participants will practice how to use strategies to improve their own workplace environments.
3. Participants will learn how to support the health and wellness of others at work.

T12: PM
Title: Don’t Panic: Harm Reduction and Peer Based Suicide Support
Format: Presentation
Presenter: Carly Boyce, MSW

This workshop is especially for people for whom traditional suicide intervention training and approaches sometimes bumps up against our values and beliefs. How can we talk about harm reduction and suicide? What does it mean for intervening with suicidal folks if we believe in body autonomy? How do we intervene in communities where completed suicide is very common, and thoughts of suicide even more so? This session will deconstruct some dominant narratives about suicidal feelings, thoughts, and behaviours, as well as the tools we use to try and address them. We will also talk through some concrete tools for having supportive conversations with people who are suicidal that take body autonomy, power and oppression, and harm reduction into account. 

Learning objectives:

1. To identify how dominant narratives around suicide and suicide intervention impact people struggling with getting support around their feelings or behaviours related to suicide
2. To develop a greater understanding of the ways that traditional suicide intervention services and strategies can be inaccessible or even harmful to some folks, especially those who experience multiple marginalizations. 
3. To gain some new tools and ideas for how to integrate harm reduction, anti-oppression, and body autonomy into suicide intervention practices.