Feb 20, 2025 | Mental Health, Faces of HDGH
February is Psychology Month in Canada and Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare (HDGH) wants to showcase the psychologists that work here and the role that they play in a patient’s healthcare journey. Clinical psychologists are mental health clinicians with doctoral degrees who are registered with the College of Psychologists and Behavioural Analysts of Ontario. At HDGH, psychology plays a part in a number of the adult services, as well as in the children's services at the Regional Children’s Centre.
In the Toldo Neurobehavioural Institute, which is our inpatient specialized mental healthcare facility, the clinical psychologist, currently Dr. Bethany King, provides therapy and assessment services and has the support of a part time psychometrist. The psychologist is a key member of the multi-disciplinary team, which is made up of psychiatry, nursing, social work, occupational therapy, certified rehab assistants, recreational therapy and consults on developing treatment plans for the 49 patients in this program.
HDGH also has a neuropsychologist providing services in the inpatient rehabilitation and outpatient Acquired Brain Injury programs. The neuropsychologist provides assessments (also supported by a part time psychometrist) to evaluate cognitive functioning and therapy services, as well as consults with the multi-disciplinary team. Dr. Anne McLachlan recently retired from this position after 30 years.
At the Regional Children’s Centre (RCC), three psychologists offer psychological assessment and consultation services to a variety of programs. Current RCC psychologists include Dr. Amanda Darroch, Dr. Jenna Jones, and Dr. Lauren Wysman. RCC psychologists offer psychological assessments to clients aged 6 to 12 years receiving outpatient mental health counselling and/or those enrolled in the Intensive Treatment Services (ITS) Day Treatment program to determine their cognitive, academic, behavioural, and socio-emotional functioning. They also run an Autism screening clinic and subsequent Autism diagnostic assessments for children and adolescents aged 6 to 17 years in the community; this is the only publicly-funded autism assessment program in Windsor-Essex for this age group. To complete this work, psychologists are supported by one full-time and one part-time psychometrist, who assist with Autism screenings and diagnostic assessments. In addition, RCC psychologists offer consultation services to social workers regarding treatment of complex cases and report reviews for those clients who have an existing assessment.
HDGH psychologists also offer supervision to doctoral students, primarily from the University of Windsor's clinical psychology graduate program, through practicum placements and are very proud to support the training of future clinical psychologists