On October 29th, 2024, the second National Perinatal Mental Health Symposium brought together over 125 diverse stakeholders to inspire cross-sector collaboration and encourage transformative solutions to perinatal mental health challenges.

The Daymark Foundation has chosen Newfoundland & Labrador as the site for its pilot project, with insights poised to inform a nationwide rollout to advance perinatal mental health.

As a systems-change foundation aiming to have an outsized impact, funding is only one of the ways we advance our focus areas. LASER is a new multi-pronged framework that guides our oversight and engagement in grants and partnerships.

We commissioned a study to explore the impacts and uses of a maternal mental health social media platform, and found that it helped mothers become more aware of mental health symptoms, seek care, gain confidence as parents, increase self-compassion, and prioritize their own health and wellbeing.

Without data that can be collated, analyzed and compared across centres and jurisdictions, it is near impossible to know the prevalence of perinatal mental illness and implement changes required in healthcare services.

Earlier this year, we proposed to facilitate the development of a sector-wide strategic plan for addressing perinatal mental health – starting with an initial stakeholder survey to help inform a high-level framework of goals, principles and priorities that stakeholders can rally around. Here are the key findings from the survey.

With support from the Daymark Foundation, Youth Wellness Hubs Ontario (YWHO) conducted a scoping review to identify existing knowledge, knowledge gaps, and evidence-based approaches for early detection and intervention for youth with/at risk of developing bipolar disorder.

Opening remarks from our Executive Chair, Lauren McCain, at Daymark’s National Perinatal Mental Health Policy Symposium on November 22nd, 2023.

This discussion paper summarises the challenges, barriers, and opportunities in an early intervention approach to BD, and outlines a set of proposed ideas for advancing this field.

We’re exploring ways to raise awareness of the importance of perinatal mental health, and encourage and enable mothers and birthing folks to care for themselves (in realistic, meaningful ways). To start, we've rounded up a list of evidence-based perinatal mental health promotion strategies.

The Daymark Foundation is looking to play a coordinating and facilitative role in surfacing, formulating and communicating key policy priorities in perinatal mental health to provincial and territorial governments.

The Daymark Foundation is initiating steps towards the creation of a multi-year doula mutual aid fund to support Black, Indigenous and 2SLGBTQ+ Communities.

How can we increase access to doula care for Black, Indigenous and 2SLGBTQ+ people in a sustainable way?

We are on a learning journey to figure out how we can add value to the bipolar disorder space. Here are some of our early thoughts.

While a stepped care approach to mental health has been pursued in many jurisdictions, perinatal mental health is a unique context that warrants more specific discussion on how its concepts might be applied.