The Margaret and Wallace McCain Centre for Child, Youth, and Family Mental Health

Our Commitment

The McCain Centre partners with young people, families, service providers, and communities to develop, evaluate, and amplify innovative approaches to drive system change for youth mental health.

In line with Connected CAMH Strategic Plan 2024-2030, we aim to:

We are very grateful for the contributions of our inaugural Director and Associate Director of the McCain Centre, Drs. Jo Henderson (2015-2025) and Darren Courtney (2023-2026).

The following was important to define in the visioning process:

• “Young people” refers to people ages 6 to 24 years old with some projects that extend to 29 years old. 
• “Systems” include (but is not limited to) education systems, justice systems, health care systems, governments, and the natural environment. 
• “Psychosocial” refers to:
  1. the unique aspects of each young person coming to care, including (but not limited to) needs, strengths, gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, spirituality, religion, language, geographical origin, personal historical experiences and their intersections; 
  2. the emotional, cognitive, and behavioural aspects of the young person’s experience;
  3. the family, cultural, and community context in which these experiences occur; and
  4. the interactions between the above; that is, multi-directional relationship where the individual affects the system and the system affects the individual.

• “Approaches” include strategies for assessment, understanding, and treatment of mental health and substance use challenges.