About Us

WHAT DOES ECHO DO?

It’s an interactive virtual education and capacity building initiative that supports the spread of evidence-based mental health and addictions care across the province of Ontario.

Healthcare providers join ECHO sessions to gain skills, knowledge, and confidence. Through ECHO, providers enhance (or advance) their practice and improve care for people seeking mental health and addictions services.

ECHO'S GOALS

ECHO Ontario Mental Health aims to build virtual communities of practice that support high quality mental health and addictions care.

ECHO'S GROWTH

We started in 2015 with a program on general mental health. 

Since then, we’ve expanded to a portfolio of more than 10 programs across the field of mental health and addictions.

ECHO'S IMPACT

We have reached 2000+ providers from 700+ organizations.

ECHO Programs:

  • Promote evidence-based practices in mental health and addictions care.
  • Model interdisciplinary, team-based mental health and addictions care.
  • Decreased isolation through a supportive and collaborative virtual community of practice.
  • Integrate people with lived experience to enhance delivery of patient-centered care.
  • Improve healthcare quality for underserved populations.

PARTICIPANT FEEDBACK

We’re all about continuous improvement of our programs, and we do this through a variety of evaluation tools. 

For example, in the 2019/2020 fiscal year participants in our programs gave us an average score of 4.20 out of 5 when in regards to our programs expanding knowledge and enhancing skills. 

Here’s some feedback from one of our participants:

  • “ECHO is a great place to both learn and share expertise in an inter-professional environment, where one is challenged to rake risks and try new things. I have learned something from every session that I can apply to my work the very same day.” – ECHO Ontario Mental Health Participant

What Happens in a Session?

WELCOME & INTROS

The session facilitator welcomes everyone and we do introductions of everyone on the call to help build a sense of community. 

DIDACTIC PRESENTATION

Each session, a subject matter expert gives a 20-25 minute presentation on a specific topic (i.e. Applying Mindfulness to OCD Treatment).

These didactics may involve interactive activities (i.e. quizzes, polls, demonstrations of tools, etc). There is time at the end of the presentation for participants to ask questions and have a discussion with the presenter.

CASE PRESENTATION

The bulk of our sessions is focused on discussing real-life (anonymized) case studies. 

Each session, we ask one of our participants to bring forward a client case they are having difficulties with (i.e. They aren’t sure how to provide proper treatment to someone with OCD and Depression. Where do they start?)

During these case presentations, the group works collaboratively to problem solve and come up with recommendations.