Researchers can start to think in new ways and ‘outside the box’ by engaging patients, according to Gillian.

Transcript

Oh I think hugely, particularly youth and families they can think outside the box, right? Everyone else is inside the box. Service providers, they’re mostly inside the box and because they are literally working within the system the box being they work for the system. And so it’s not that they can’t. It’s just naturally more difficult. Whereas the youth and family will say things like, you know, the youth will say when we are going off to university, this is transition to adult services, my mom takes me to three, four different universities, we sample the programs, we sit in on a class, we check it out, why can’t we do that when it comes to adult mental services? We know we’re leaving child services, why can’t we go and sample, why are we, you know?

So it’s that kind of out of the box thinking that I think youth and families really bring to the work as well as lived experience and, you know, that ability to articulate this is what it feels like for me when this happens, you know. And to understand okay, now I understand why this is happening but still you need to understand what that feels like for me. And I think that’s what it brings to the work.

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