National Summit on Indigenous Mental Wellness
The summit is an opportunity to share best practices and improve mental wellness services for First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples.
On this page
What is the summit
The National Summit on Indigenous Mental Wellness brings together Indigenous leaders, organizations, tribal councils, mental health professionals and government officials to share and discuss examples of what is working to improve the mental wellness of First Nations, Inuit and Métis.
The summit is important for First Nations, Inuit and Métis to highlight successes and ways forward grounded in Indigenous perspectives. They support collaboration and knowledge exchange.
Focusing on initiatives that are distinctions-based, Indigenous-led with a focus on culture and community, each summit has specific themes developed with First Nations, Inuit and Métis partners. These themes highlight key areas and emerging issues, and build on related dialogues on mental wellness. Highlight reports are created for each summit to capture important perspectives around these themes and identify areas for further discussion.
The summit provides guidance to Indigenous Services Canada in their work on mental wellness, strengthening collaborations with First Nations, Inuit and Métis partners, while building on Indigenous mental wellness frameworks, such as the:
2023 summit highlights
National Summit on Indigenous Mental Wellness 2023
The 2023 National Summit on Indigenous Mental Wellness centered on the importance of culture, community, healing from trauma and Indigenous youth.
Transcript of video: The 2023 National Summit on Indigenous Mental Wellness
Text on screen:
On October 25 and 26, 2023, Ottawa hosted the Second National Summit on Indigenous Mental Wellness. The objective was to support Indigenous mental wellness and promote healing through strength-based approaches.
Chief n̓aasʔałuk (John Rampanen)
Ahousaht First Nation
John Rampanen:
Our intention of being here at the National Summit on Indigenous Mental Wellness is to open up lines of communication not only with government officials but, most importantly, with other Indigenous Peoples and organizations as well, because we know that in order to walk that path that we're going to have to work collaboratively.
Text on screen:
Dr. Carol Hopkins
Executive Director, Thunderbird Partnership Foundation
Dr. Carol Hopkins:
Indigenous Peoples, people of the land, the original people of this land, the First Nations people, we have strengths, we have answers, we have solutions, we have good evidence, we have ways of knowing.
Text on screen:
Dr. Brenda Restoule
CEO, First Peoples Wellness Circle
Dr. Brenda Restoule:
We have a responsibility to recognize that we all must take care of everybody in our communities, regardless of what their challenges are. Our teachings have taught us that we all have a place in our communities and we all have a role.
Text on screen:
Kelsey Todd
Métis Nation British Columbia
Kelsey Todd:
The Métis experience is either overlooked, underrepresented, or completely erased.
Métis people know what's best for Métis people. And if we want to develop Métis programming, if we want to do things for Métis people, it needs to be led by Métis people.
John Rampanen:
The approach moving forward is also to keep an eye on the ancestral components of who we are.
What we feel is that we're building off the legacy of our ancestors, and the knowledge base and the intelligence and the strength and the beauty that they contain have a lot to teach us and remind us of the inner fortitude and resilience that we have and the ability to be able to take this type of challenge on.
Dr. Carol Hopkins:
We need capacity in First Nations communities to address the crisis of opioids, methamphetamine, and alcohol. We need our culture, but we also need to have good allies who are practicing medicine, you know, people who are prescribers, physicians, nurse practitioners. We need allies who are, who can commit to community development.
Dr. Brenda Restoule:
Once you start talking about it from a strengths-based approach and talking about mental wellness, it really forces people to think about, what are the strengths in our communities and why are we not investing in strengths?
Not because we don't want to attend to those issues that are causing struggles and harm to our community. But when you invest in strengths, you help people develop resiliency, you help people develop skills, and it also gives them, I think, a real sense of hope, which is of course, one of the outcomes of the First Nations Mental Wellness Continuum Framework.
Hope that, you know, I can overcome this, I can deal with the challenges I have in my life.
Text on screen:
Stephanie Nirlungayuk
Pauktuutit Inuit Women of Canada
Stephanie Nirlungayuk:
It's so inspiring to see all of the work that everyone is doing. It makes me so hopeful for our Indigenous, specifically youth. It makes me feel good knowing that my cousins and my relatives are going to have a space, a safe space going forward. So, it's been really, really beautiful to see all the work that everyone is doing here.
Dr. Carol Hopkins:
I am optimistic. As a leader in mental wellness, I accept the responsibility that my Elders have taught me, is that we have a responsibility to create hope, support hope and ensure hope for the future.
Text on screen:
Distinctions-based approaches that focus on culture, traditional knowledge and community that are developed by Indigenous Peoples for Indigenous Peoples are most effective in improving mental wellness for First Nations, Inuit and Métis.
The 2023 National Summit on Indigenous Mental Wellness was held in Ottawa on October 25 to 26, 2023.
Representatives from Indigenous communities, front-line services and Indigenous experts in mental wellness, gathered to discuss the unique mental wellness needs of First Nations, Inuit and Métis communities, and share examples of what is working to improve mental wellness of Indigenous peoples.
The 2-day event was hosted was hosted by the Minister of Indigenous Services, included participation of the Minister of Mental Health and Addictions and Associate Minister of Health, and welcomed over 750 participants in-person and virtually.
The 2023 summit provided opportunities for knowledge exchange on themes identified by First Nations, Inuit and Métis partners, that built on discussions from the 2022 summit with a distinctions-based perspective, overarching themes of culture, community and healing from trauma, and a focus on Indigenous youth.
Learn more about the 2023 national summit:
2022 summit highlights
The 2022 National Summit on Indigenous Mental Wellness was held in Toronto on September 23, 2022, and featured almost 70 presentations highlighting examples of what is improving mental wellness for First Nations, Inuit and Métis. More than 600 participants attended the event in-person and virtually.
A highlights report captured the key themes from the 2022 summit and reflected what was heard during presentations and discussions.
Key messages include:
- Continuing the discussion on Indigenous mental wellness as a key step forward to ensuring consistent sharing of knowledge and ideas, as well as empowering connections and collaboration to make change.
- Distinctions-based approaches that focus on culture, traditional knowledge and community, that are developed by Indigenous people for Indigenous people, are most effective in improving mental wellness for First Nations, Inuit and Métis.
- Supporting communities in accessing and delivering services means building capacity, empowering innovation, ensuring flexible, long-term and sustained funding, and bringing options for care and support closer to home.
- Effective approaches exist, but challenges lie in barriers to accessing care (for example stigma and racism) and lack of limited human, financial and program resources, particularly for populations with specific needs such as youth, children, families and people who identify as 2SLGBTQQIA+.
- The mental wellness workforce that supports communities is an essential piece of improving mental wellness for First Nations, Inuit and Métis. More support is needed to ensure pay equity; improve the ability to recruit and retain; address burnout, stress and fatigue; and build capacity in communities and youth organizations. This includes looking to establish an Indigenous association for the mental wellness workforce.
Learn more about the 2022 national summit:
- Read the 2022 National Summit highlight report
- National Summit on Indigenous Mental Wellness wraps up in Toronto
- Request summaries or the YouTube links for the 2022 summit by contacting enregistrementausnmema-nsimwregistration@sac-isc.gc.ca