Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'd like to share the story of one resident's path to getting healing. It begins with a violent and sudden death of a family member, and that resident, you know, starts to struggle to sleep, develops severe anxiety, has nightmares, and it starts to affect their ability at their job, Mr. Speaker.
Some weeks go by and things don't get better in processing that trauma so they decide to seek help. They do what many of us do. They go to the GNWT website and they find we have a community counselling program. You know, it takes a few calls but eventually they get into a sameday program. But it becomes abundantly clear, in speaking with that counsellor, that this is not a matter just for a regular community counsellor. They have to get in they get in to see a psychiatrist. I'm sure that counsellor tries their best, but a psychiatrist is the place they are recommended to start. It takes a few more weeks, a number of phone calls to, you know, finally get in a spot with the psychiatrist. The initial assessment is quite obviously PTSD and some more time to get medication. The medication starts to help, but it is the psychiatrist's recommendation that a regular program of therapy with a psychologist occur.
That resident asks, can I get a referral to a psychologist and unfortunately that is not something we do. We have a few psychologists on staff, but they are not able to be referred for general members of the public. They said they have to go and phone psychologists which are found on a website who are privately funded. They make a few phone calls, Mr. Speaker, and then quickly finds out that some of their wait lists are years. Many of them do not specialize in PTSD, and many of them just rightfully can't add them to their wait list knowing they can't take on new patients.
This resident struggles struggles to find a psychologist willing to treat their PTSD. Things are not getting better. They're struggling at work. Eventually this patient decides to go out of territory and find an online psychologist. This was not their first preference. They wanted to meet in person. It was not something they were necessarily comfortable with doing it virtually, but they begin to get help. It costs over $200 an hour to have those appointments. They are paid out of their pocket and as they are struggling to work, this becomes a significant financial burden where they are then faced with continuing to treat their PTSD or to put food on the table for their family.
Now, Mr. Speaker, this resident eventually pulls through. Through the help of medication and their own will starts to process their trauma and starts to heal. Yet, Mr. Speaker, it was not an easy path, and we know many people go through this and fall through the cracks. I'll have questions for the Minister of health about what we can do to make sure people have access to a psychologist when they need one. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member for Yellowknife North. Member for Inuvik Twin Lakes.
