The Royal

Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, women and gender-diverse people had significant mental health concerns.

• Women are nearly twice as likely as men to be diagnosed with depression, but experience more barriers in getting care.

• Women tend to experience more concurrent mental health disorders. Depression might be accompanied by anxiety, agoraphobia (feeling unsafe), panic disorders, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

• An alarming 80% of individuals with eating disorders are women, which has the highest overall mortality rate of any mental illness.

• 25.7% of young women have self-harmed – more than twice the rate of young men.

 
Monies raised as part of Run for Women, including 100% of donations collected, will increase access to care, fund important local services at The Royal, and support the diverse needs of women who are under-recognized, under-served and have specialized mental health needs for which traditional (often-male focused) mental health services are not appropriate or sufficiently sensitive.
 
We need to address the unique way women experience mental illness, treatment, recovery, and care. Women are faced with inequalities, and addressing these issues is imperative, not only for women, but for the health of our community. Help us close the gender gaps in mental health and expand access to gender-specific mental health research and care by registering or making a donation today.

Thank you for caring about gender-specific mental health Ottawa! Since 2011, you and your peers, families and friends have raised over $2.6 million to support vitally important programs and resources delivered by and through The Royal.

Shirley E. Greenberg Resource Centre for Women

A cornerstone of the Women’s Mental Health program is the Shirley E. Greenberg Resource Centre for Women. The resource centre’s main focus is to provide information about available supports to women with mental illness and their family members. The centre serves as a hub for education, peer and family support groups, as well as a safer space for women receiving care at The Royal. Often patients will stop by the centre to spend time with visiting children, to simply relax, or utilize centre resources (computers, telephone, reading materials, etc.).
 

Prompt Care Clinic

The Prompt Care Clinic offers quick access to specialized mental health services for a group of people who require a different level (or secondary level) of mental health service. It is an evolution of The Royal’s C-Prompt Clinic, which opened in the spring of 2020 to address urgent mental health needs when services were closed or scaled back due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It fulfills an important need within the continuum of mental health care in the region by providing timely access to specialized psychiatric care for adults ages 18-65 years who are experiencing symptoms of mild to moderate mental illness.
 
A team that includes nurses, psychiatrists, psychologists, and social workers staffs the Prompt Care Clinic, which was developed in collaboration with The Ottawa Hospital. Services include general mental health assessments and treatment recommendations, short-term psychotherapy (up to four sessions per client), and medication recommendations. A hybrid service of both in-person and virtual care modalities are available based on client preference.

The Prompt Care Clinic is a complementary service to primary care and community based mental health services. To access the clinic’s services, clients must be referred by a primary care provider (i.e. a family doctor or nurse practitioner). Learn more here.
 

Regional Psychosis Centre

Psychosis is a condition that affects how the brain processes information. During a period of psychosis, a person may have difficulty understanding what is real and what is not. Psychosis involves hallucinations (visual and/or auditory experiences that are not real) and/or delusions (false beliefs not based in reality).
 
People who have schizophrenia spectrum disorders experience psychosis but it can be a symptom for other conditions as well. It is estimated that one in every 100 people have a schizophrenia spectrum disorder. In the Ottawa region, 12,000 people live with schizophrenia and 300 more will develop it this year. While women and men are equally likely to develop psychosis, in women the condition usually starts later in life and progresses at a different pace. Although there is no cure, there are effective medical and therapeutic interventions available.
 
The Ozerdinc Grimes Family Regional Psychosis Clinic helps to ensure that people with schizophrenia and their families have access to the specialized care and support they need throughout the recovery journey.
 

The Women’s Mental Health Program

Women are faced with inequalities, and we understand that addressing these issues is imperative, not only for women, but for the health of our community. The Women's Mental Health Program was created out of an important need to address the unique way women experience mental illness, treatment, recovery, and care. It incorporates a recovery-oriented, trauma-informed approach to care through community-based outreach to women’s shelters, as well as hospital based programs.
We promote mental health and well-being for all women by ensuring women’s experiences with the mental health system reflects their unique biological, psychological and social needs/roles. Through capacity building, peer support, and research we offer groups, events, education, and resources all created with women in mind. Learn more here.