Virtual Innovations in Care (VIC) Grant Program

The 8 recipient organization will conduct formative evaluations on their respective virtual innovation that will explore one or more of the following themes:

Youth Engagement and Peer Support

• Understanding impact on youth advisory/advisors and peer support workers.
  Exploring how the initiative continued to engage with youth and integrate their expertise into virtual program design and delivery.
• Exploring the impact on formal youth roles and structures (i.e. peer support workers) and how their roles evolved during the move to virtual care.
• Identifying innovative practices and elements of youth engagement and peer support during virtual care service that will be sustained.
• Understanding the impacts from the perspective of those using service and those providing service.

Family Engagement

• Understanding the impact on family advisors and/or families supporting youth receiving services.
• Exploring how families have been impacted by the move to virtual service.
• Identifying innovative practices and elements of family engagement support during virtual care service that will be sustained.
• Understanding the impacts from the perspective of those using service and those providing service.

Service Design and Delivery

• Understanding the change in service delivery and the impact on programming as services move to virtual care.
• Exploring what services moved virtually and the evolution of service design.
• Identification and capturing of evidence-based established and/or emerging virtual services that have serviced the needs of youth and their families.
• Exploring the differences between services designed for virtual delivery and those that transitioned rapidly to virtual delivery.
• Understanding the impacts from the perspective of those using service and those providing service.

Implementation Process

• Understanding the administrative and site processes required to implement virtual services.
• Identification and exploration of impact on service provision teams how these groups work together to evolve the service model to include virtual service.
• Capturing of learnings about implementing virtual service.
• Identifying some of the barriers and gaps to available service/ service gaps
• Understanding the impacts from the perspective of those using service and those providing service

COVID-19 has shifted healthcare in Canada to a place in which in-person services are no longer an option in many jurisdictions and contexts. The valuable insights through this initiative, as well as the community learnings through the VIC program, will help the system better understand the nuances of virtual services. Frayme will work with VIC recipients during the next year to help support knowledge mobilization efforts so that these virtual services can be expanded across jurisdictions and so that more youth and families can access the right care in the right place at the right time.

QUOTES FROM FRAYME AND SUPPORTING PARTNERS

“The youth mental health and substance use system has collectively prioritized virtual care. We are at the precipice of being able to understand how to support youth and their families through technology and if there are ways we can address geographic constraints, accessibility constraints and resource constraints,” said Shauna MacEachern, Executive Director, Frayme. “As we design these services we must ensure that we are evaluating and implementing them with feedback from youth and families. Through VIC, Frayme is uniquely positioned to ensure that evaluation not only takes place, but that learnings are mobilized across the country so that effective virtual services can be scaled widely.”

“We recognize the importance of mental well-being on a young person’s ability to achieve success and their successes directly impact the strength of our workplaces, schools and communities,” said Mark Beckles, Senior Director, Youth Strategy and Innovation, RBC. “Through our partnerships with organizations such as Frayme, RBC Future Launch will help address the barriers often faced by young people when trying to access the mental well-being supports and services they need. Effective virtual services will help to remove or lower some of those barriers.”

“The Graham Boeckh Foundation is pleased to see that Frayme has prioritized supporting research and evaluation in virtual care,” said Elana Ludman, Vice President Youth Mental Health, Graham Boeckh Foundation. “With more and more services being offered in virtual contexts, we need to better understand what impact these services are having on youth and their families. We hope that these grants will further add to the evidence base, help create more integrated models of mental health and substance use care, and share lessons learned with other communities across Canada.”

Read the VIC Announcement Press Release
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