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This BC Children’s Hospital program aims to improve the experiences and outcomes of young people and their families accessing mental health & substance use services through collaborative partnerships, training and education, and systems transformation.
The program is focused on identifying system-level barriers that impact young people’s (16 – 24) ability to access appropriate and timely mental health & substance use care.
People in the missing middle:
- are often too unwell for community-based mental health care, but not unwell enough for bed-based hospital and tertiary services
- often present to hospital emergency departments due to mental ill-health which could have been avoided with adequate care in the community, often leaving the emergency department without adequate and assertive follow-up

63-75% of mental illnesses present before the age of 25 years old ¹
While most mental health challenges are emerging, our systems are at their weakest; young people between the ages of 16 and 24 are struggling to connect to appropriate care due to a clear divide between the child & adolescent, and adult mental health and substance use systems
As a result of the above noted issue, 50% of young people drop out of mental health and/or addiction services at entry to adult services ²
In some Canadian jurisdictions, as few as 25% of youth with diagnosable mental health and substance use disorders receive the care they need ³

The provincial education program aims to support health care providers and others to build knowledge and capacity to facilitate the best possible support to young people and their families.
This work is informed by advisory and focus groups which include individuals with lived and living experience, clinicians, researchers, regional health authority partners, Indigenous health partners, and government representatives.