With peer support, Hamilton hospital helps build trust, provide comfort for those in substance use program
CBC
Marcie McIlveen never thought she'd work in a hospital.
Due to her negative experiences in treatment for substance use disorder on about 14 occasions, "I hated health care, did not like it, wanted nothing to do with it," McIlveen said.
What she endured, however, has led to the work she does today. McIlveen is a peer support supervisor of a new St. Joseph's Healthcare Hamilton project — it involves people who've experienced addiction offering support to patients in the substance use program.
Peer supporters keep patients company, get them comfort items and talk through problems.
So how did someone who loathed hospitals end up spearheading a pilot? It started with handing out lunches to people in need.
About five years ago, McIlveen was sober and looking for work. She started a job giving out food with the Hamilton organization Keeping Six, not realizing it was connected to physicians with the Hamilton Social Medicine Response Team (HamSmart), she said.
"Even then, I didn't want to help people," McIlveen told CBC Hamilton. "I didn't want to be part of a system that tells people how they have to get well."
Keeping Six and HamSmart practise harm reduction, which focuses on keeping people who use drugs safe, as opposed to taking a treatment- or abstinence-first approach to care.
Eventually, McIlveen got to know Dr. Tim O'Shea and Dr. Robin Lennox, both of whom worked with those organizations.
"I grew to trust these people because I'd seen what they were doing," McIlveen said.
After visiting hospitals to be with people they knew who were receiving care, the three started talking about how they could formalize peer support.
McIlveen was hesitant, but resolved, "If I'm going to do this, we need to be transparent in the fact that some people fall through cracks."
Satisfied she could work with the hospital and be true to her values, she agreed.
The proposal for the project was developed by O'Shea, who co-founded HamSmart, and Lennox, a family physician specializing in substance use care who was recently elected member of provincial parliament (MPP) for Hamilton Centre.
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