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Every year, tobacco use kills 16,000 Ontarians and costs the health care system an estimated $6.1 billion, making it our most deadly and most costly addiction. Quitting smoking—and staying quit—is an immense challenge for many Ontarians, but none more so than people with mental health problems. Eighty per cent of CAMH inpatients smoke. It’s not hard to see why smoking is a priority for CAMH.

“Other than the big tobacco companies, I don't know of any organization in the world that has so many people working on nicotine.” Dr. Paul Garfinkel, President and CEO

This year, we hired two internationally renowned experts in addiction, Dr. Tony George from Yale University and Dr. Bernard Le Foll from the U.S. National Institutes of Health.

They join the 50 CAMH staff focusing on every aspect of smoking, from genetic, social and population research to treatment, health promotion and prevention. We have developed new understandings of nicotine dependence and launched successful new province-wide stop-smoking programs.

CAMH takes an integrated, holistic approach to tobacco use—as it does to all complex addiction and mental health issues. This means using research to improve clinical care, as well as building education, health promotion and disease prevention programs in the community. Working with the Ministry of Health Promotion and the Ontario Pharmacists’ Association, CAMH has distributed nicotine replacement therapy province-wide by partnering with local pharmacists and public health units.

CAMH runs smoking cessation and awareness programs through our 32 provincial sites and community-based partnerships. These programs, ranging from teen tobacco challenges in schools to programs targeting French-speaking immigrants or the lesbian and gay community, reach thousands of people annually.

CAMH’s STOP Study helped 1,600 Ontarians quit smoking

(Click image for larger view) Dr. Peter Selby at one of several official events held this year in collaboration with the Ministry of Health Promotion to launch different phases of the STOP Study.

Our groundbreaking STOP (Smoking Treatment for Ontario Patients) Study showed promising results for a new approach to smoking cessation.

The mass-distribution program provided free nicotine replacement therapy (NRT), such as nicotine gum or patches, to nearly 14,000 participants. At least 12% of the participants stayed off tobacco for six months. The normal quit rate is seven per cent for Ontarians under age 45, and three per cent for those over 45.

“It would take 14 years to help 14,000 smokers quit through other therapies. With this model of distributing NRT, we were able to reach a wider audience and help them in a shorter time frame,” says Dr. Peter Selby, Clinical Director of Addictions Programs at CAMH and Principal Investigator of the STOP Study.

Making Connections: Integration in Mental Health and Addiction

• Message from the Chair and President
• Making connections between people and clinical care
  • Law and Mental Health Program
  • Child, Youth and Family Program
  • Connecting older people with mental health and addiction services
  • Linking therapy and culture competence: Expanding services to Aboriginal people
  • Integrating the social determinants of health into care, research and education
• Connecting research with everything else we do
  • Linking research to health promotion: From the neuron to the neighbourhood
• Linking communities locally, provincially and globally
  • Helping underserved areas
  • Educating local service providers throughout Ontario
  • Reaching francophone communities
  • Building capacity in the community
  • CAMH Provincial Services
  • Connecting CAMH expertise to needs around the globe
  • Building capacity in Sri Lanka
• Building on excellence
  • Building a world-class hospital
• Financial snapshot (PDF version only)
• CAMH by the numbers (PDF version only)
• Board of Trustees as of March 31, 2007
• Senior Management Group
• How to reach CAMH