2023-08-08 - Ontario Mental Health and Addictions Data and Digital Initiative

Context
Addictions and Mental Health Ontario (AMHO) represents and supports approximately 175 member organizations across the province with the aim of bringing the best possible substance use, addictions, and mental health care to those who need it. We provide members with guidance, partnership, and a collective voice in advocating to government decision-makers for adequate funding and policy reform. Another central function of AMHO is to facilitate training and knowledge exchange, with the goal of improving the quality of mental health and addictions (MHA) care.

The Mental Health and Addictions Centre of Excellence (COE) at Ontario Health has started to implement the Mental Health and Addictions Data and Digital Initiative (DDI), in alignment with a pillar of the province’s mental health and addictions framework, the Roadmap to Wellness: Improving Quality – driving quality through data and digital. The key components of the initiative include standardizing data definitions and collection across the mental health and addictions sector, creating of a centralized data repository, and improving the use of data for service planning and decision-making.

The DDI includes the introduction of a preliminary, standardized Mental Health and Addictions Provincial Data Set (MHA-PDS) to enable the consistent collection and reporting of data across all MHA providers in the province. The MHA-PDS will eventually become mandatory for organizations to report on to Ontario Health, with some organizations already submitting data to the MHA-PDS and others in the process of onboarding throughout 2023/24.

Since Fall 2022, AMHO has been engaging as a Coordinating Lead Organization, alongside CMHA Ontario and Mental Health Partners, Reconnect Community Health Services, and the DDI team at Ontario Health to advance the onboarding of all Ministry of Health-funded MHA organizations to the MHA-PDS. This has included hosting webinars and undertaking outreach to identify the current state of data collection at the organizational level, readiness to onboarding to the PDS, and any barriers / challenges to implementation.  In addition to the supports provided to the sector by the three Coordinating Lead Organizations and Ontario Health, the Coordinating Lead Organizations have also worked to identify Data Champions, which are MHA service providers that are further along in the MHA-PDS onboarding process. Data Champions can draw upon existing relationships and expertise with their sector partners to provide advice and supports to other MHA service providers to onboard and report on the MHA-PDS to Ontario Health. Reconnect Community Health Services is a Data Champion that has provided project management and implementation support to a wide range of MHA providers. Further details on this work can be found in Appendix A.

Invitation and Purpose 
AMHO is seeking a consultant to support its role as a Coordinating Lead Organization, including working with MHA service providers to onboard and implement the MHA-PDS, providing updates on this work to AMHO leadership and Ontario Health, and supporting AMHO with other data and technological projects. 
 

1. Act as a coordinating lead to assist AMHO members, and other providers as identified, to onboard and implement the MHA-PDS:

1. Survey AMHO members and other providers, to obtain information to support the implementation of the MHA-PDS.
2. Reach out to individual providers that have not completed the survey, to facilitate the completion of the survey.
3. Respond to questions and concerns from providers, and work directly to support their understanding of the PDS and begin the onboarding process.
4. Work with other coordinating leads, in collaboration with the AMHO policy team, to remain engaged on progress and requirements to prepare providers for MHA-PDS implementation.

2. Act as a coordinating lead to assist data champions in readying other community health service providers (HSPs) for the implementation to the MHA-PDS

1. Identify AMHO members that have onboarded to the MHA-PDS with the capacity and skills to serve as data champions and support other providers to onboard.
2. Identify MHA tables regionally that could be a point of contact/ engagement for community MHA providers.
3. Present approach and regular updates on the MHA-PDS Data Champion work to AMHO leadership and policy team.

3. Support mental health and addictions HSPs in the implementation of the PDS including, but not limited to CMS vendor management, decision support/data quality, quality and process improvement and project/change management:

1. Identify MHA-PDS supports needed for implementation (may be provider- or CMS vendor-specific).
2. For providers that have implemented the MHA-PDS, provide support around data collection and data quality.
3. Leverage lessons learned from working with providers at various stages of onboarding to support HSPs that have not yet implemented the MHA-PDS.
4. Work with Reconnect to identify system issues with vendors and to support implement of solutions across providers.

4. Provide decision support on a range of topics that impact AMHO membership, including but not limited to the MHA-PDS:

1. Review onboarding requirements and barriers to implementation to identify opportunities for improvement and enable guidance of HSPs to support their onboarding.
2. Lead the analysis of data sets, and development / maintenance of tools to provide actionable insights to better inform business decisions.
3. Provide technical direction and quality control oversight to ensure integration across all data initiatives and digital tools impacting AMHO membership.
4. Gathering and maintaining automated dashboards, metric reports, and data visualization in collaboration with policy team and as required.