Young adults, Mental Health and the Justice System
September 27, 2011
Hosted by Dr. Gordon Atherley
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Guest Information
Episode Description
Gerard Allard, who entered politics as a Manitoba Liberal, is a City of Winnipeg police officer with 24 years of service. Bruce Ritchie is Moderator & CEO of FASlink Fetal Alcohol Disorders Society, and single father of a son who was diagnosed with fetal alcohol syndrome as an infant. They describe young adults who get into trouble with the justice system. They discuss the challenges mental health conditions bring to young adults. They explain the problems with mental functioning that cause the young adults to get into trouble. They share views about the ways in which the police and the justice system deal with young adults with mental health challenges. They say how serious the social consequences are, and discuss the ways in which the existing systems affect the social consequences. They talk about the help that’s needed by the young adults and the police. They say what they believe needs to be done to address the consequences, reduce the harm, and to bring about prevention.
Family Caregivers Unite!
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Family caregivers are the people who provide care to partners, parents, children, brothers, sisters, cousins, friends, neighbors and even co-workers. They are the people who provide care when everyone else has gone home. They are the people who organize the functioning of the home for the person with special needs, and for the family as a whole. They are the coordinators of care, the managers of appointments, the preventers of loneliness, and the makers of decisions even to the point of Power of Attorney. And they are so often people who themselves are burdened with their own health challenges and who may be in only marginally better health than the persons to whom they are providing family caregiving.
Dr. Gordon Atherley
Dr Gordon Atherley holds the British equivalent of the Canadian PhD and MD degrees, and LLD, Honoris Causa, from Canada’s Simon Fraser University. His awards include Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, UK. His medical specialties are occupational medicine and public health.
As first President and Chief Executive Officer of the Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety, the Canadian equivalent of the US National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, he led the creation of Canada’s electronic information service in occupational health and safety, now used in more than 40 countries.
In academia, he held senior, tenured, full-time positions, including departmental chair, in university faculties of physics, engineering, and medicine. He is the author of a textbook and numerous articles and publications.
Since retiring from medical practice, he’s built up Greyhead Associates, which critically researches the safety, effectiveness and fairness of health services for persons with special needs.
Through Virtual Care International, a company of which he’s President, he’s involved in providing sensible technology to family caregivers to help them with their responsibilities, workloads, and concerns.
Now an activist, he urges family caregivers to unite because, more and more, it’s not just their families who depend on them, it’s also the healthcare system as a whole, as it struggles to meet more and more needs of more and more people.
