Project ECHO (Extension of Community Health Outcomes) is an evidence-based hub-and-spoke model for continuing professional development and capacity building. Several education theories have informed the development and evolution of the ECHO model and supported its impact on provider engagement, learning and practice change. Within Ontario, ECHO Ontario Mental Health at CAMH has been a novel model for mental health capacity building and further highlighted how this CPD model has supported healthcare providers caring for patients with complex mental health needs across the province. This presentation will summarize our journey in launching and expanding the ECHO Ontario Mental Health Program including how research has guided its education program design, implementation and creation of virtual communities of practice to better support healthcare providers in remote and underserved areas. 

Dr. Sanjeev Sockalingam

Dr. Sanjeev Sockalingam is Vice President, Education, Interim Physician-in-Chief, and Clinician-Scientist at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. He is Professor and Vice-Chair, Education in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto. Dr. Sockalingam is also the Co-Chair of the Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes (ECHO) Ontario Mental Health at the Centre for Addiction and Mental and Health and the University of Toronto, which is a Ministry of Health funded hub-and-spoke virtual knowledge-sharing network model building mental health and addiction capacity in Ontario.

Dr. Sockalingam has over 210 peer-reviewed publications and is a lead investigator on several peer-reviewed clinical and medical education grants. His current education research interests focus on implementation of mental health capacity building using technology and data-informed lifelong learning.

He has been the recipient of several national and international education awards related to innovation, leadership and research including the Academy of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry (ACLP) Alan Stoudemire Award for Innovation and Excellence in Education (2018), the University of Toronto Faculty President’s Teaching Award (2022), the Society for Academic Continuing Medical Education David Davis Research Award (2021), and the Association of Chairs of Psychiatry of Canada Award for Excellence in Education (2017).

Dr. Eva Serhal

Dr. Eva Serhal is Senior Director of Virtual Mental Health and Outreach, ECHO Ontario Mental Health, the ECHO Ontario Superhub and Talk Suicide Canada at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. She has overseen training and supported implementation of over 35 ECHO projects (a virtual capacity building model) nationally and internationally. At CAMH, she oversees numerous programs that create equitable access to care and mental health services, most of which leverage technology to deliver care and support.  In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Eva helped lead CAMH’s rapid transition to a virtual hospital, including the development of virtual care policies and procedures, the implementation of the virtual client experience survey, and the training of staff across the organization, leading to sustained delivery of virtual care with over 100,000 annual video visits.  Eva is also the inaugural Senior Director for Talk Suicide Canada, previously the Canada Suicide Prevention Service, a project funded through the Public Health Agency of Canada to deliver bilingual 24/7/365 talk, chat and text support for people across Canada reaching out for help in a crisis. She is helping support the planning and coordination of 988, a new three digit number for suicide prevention, to be launched in November 2023. Eva holds an MBA from the Ted Rogers School of Management at the Toronto Metropolitan University (formerly Ryerson), and a PhD in Health Services Research from the University of Toronto, with research focused on varying factors related to virtual care implementation and quality.

Best Practice in Education Rounds (BPER) are co-hosted by the Centre for Faculty Development, The Wilson Centre and the Centre for Advancing Collaborative Healthcare & Education.

This one-credit-per-hour Group Learning program meets the certification criteria of the College of Family Physicians of Canada and has been certified by Continuing Professional Development, Temerty Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto for up to 1.0 Mainpro+ credits.

This event is an Accredited Group Learning Activity (Section 1) as defined by the Maintenance of Certification Program of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, approved by Continuing Professional Development, Temerty Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto. You may claim a maximum of 1 hour (credits are automatically calculated).

For more information about BPER, please click here.

Capacity Building, Communities of Practice and Complexity: The ECHO Experience

Maria Mylopoulos