Assertive Community Treatment Program

Assertive Community Treatment (ACT) is a client-centered, recovery-oriented mental health service delivery model that has received substantial empirical support for facilitating community living, psychosocial rehabilitation, and recovery for persons who have the most serious mental illnesses, have severe symptoms and impairments, and have not benefited from traditional outpatient programs. Integrated with the other Community Adult Assessment and Treatment Service programs and a broad range of other mental health and community services, the ACT program provides team-based, intensive interventions to individual’s whose mental illness creates a significant barrier to them accessing and effectively participating in treatment through regular community mental health programs. Assertive engagement and extensive community outreach approaches are used to assist individuals in achieving sufficient recovery to access and participate in other programs and services.

The important characteristics of ACT program:

• ACT serves clients with serious mental illnesses (i.e. schizophrenia or Bipolar) and substance use disorders that are complex and who have very significant functional impairments, and who, because of the limitations of traditional mental health services, may have gone without appropriate services.
• ACT services are delivered by a group of multidisciplinary mental health staff who work as a team and provide the majority of the treatment, rehabilitation, and support services clients need to achieve their goals. Many, if not all, staff share responsibility for addressing the needs of all clients.
• ACT services are individually tailored with each client and address the preferences and identified goals of each client. The approach with each client emphasizes relationship-building and active involvement in assisting individuals with serious mental illness to make improvements in functioning, to better manage symptoms, to achieve individual goals, and to maintain optimism.
• Mental Health service delivery model that has received substantial empirical support for facilitating community living, psychosocial rehabilitation, and recovery for persons who have the most serious mental illnesses, have severe symptoms and impairments, and have not benefited from traditional outpatient programs.

The ACT program has support of a multidisciplinary team that consists of:

• Mental Health Therapists
• Occupational Therapists
• Social Workers
• Addiction Counsellor
• Psychiatry Support Workers
• Independent Living Support Workers
• Peer Support Workers
• Admin staff
• Psychiatrists

ACT shares 6 transitional site beds with a local Assisted Living Site provider (EPIN) with the ICT and Diverse City programs. ACT site provides the additional stabilization and treatment support used to prepare clients to transitioning to independent living or other sites/housing.

ACT is a recovery focused team. If the referring psychiatrist wishes to remain involved in the client’s care, they are expected to participate in client case reviews every month. If this is not possible, care may be transferred to the ACT psychiatrists while the client is under the care of ACT.

The ACT Program offers medical students and psychiatry residents the unique opportunity to learn about multidisciplinary team working and participate in client centred care for patients with severe and persistent mental illness using the recover model.