What you can expect before accessing services at Foundry Prince George

• On your first visit to Foundry Prince George, we will support you to complete our onboarding paperwork, so that we can create a chart for you.
• .You’ll let us know what’s bringing you through the door, your preferred name and pronouns, how you’d like us to communicate with you, and who you give us permission to communicate with.
• We’ll walk you through our limits to confidentiality, our services on offer, and answer any questions you have.
• You’ll complete a Health and Demographic Survey on one of our iPads. It will take 20-30 minutes, and will give us a better picture of who you are, your resources, experiences, and needs. This will be the only time you complete a survey of this length, and it will allow us to ensure you don’t have to tell your story over and over. Some of the questions will be personal, and you are able to skip past any ones you aren’t comfortable with or aren’t ready to answer. If the survey as a whole is too much to tackle, that’s OK; not completing it won’t prevent you from being able to access services.

Our Counselling Model

• We believe you already have the skills and ability to create change in your life but you may need help identifying and developing those skills.
• We focus on what works for you and how it can help you in the future instead of examining your past experiences.
• Counselling is offered in a single instance, solution focused way.
• We encourage you to see our team of counsellors as available to you. Each of them have skills and strengths that can support you in unique ways. Each are committed to the belief that you are the expert in yourself.

We respond directly to what you want to work on by focusing on what’s important to you, what you want at the end of the session and creating do-able goals with you.

At Foundry PG, our Counsellors all offer Solution Focused Brief Therapy (SFBT) and Emotion Focused Family Therapy (EFFT). Individually, they may also use other therapeutic modalities, like Dialectic Behaviour Therapy (DBT) and Narrative Therapy.

What you can expect during a counselling session

• To give us a heads up on what you want to talk about today by completing a brief walk-in survey (2-5 minutes long) on one of our iPads prior to the session starting.
• The counsellor to review confidentiality with you, explain the process to you and help you clarify your issue and the strengths and skills that you have.
• The counsellor to take a quick break with their team to brainstorm some ideas you could try to reach your goal.

For the session to end after you are offered the ideas/suggestions the team came up along with any you came up with too.

When can you come for counselling at Foundry?

• After your first visit at Foundry where we learn a bit more about what you need, if you decide our counselling model would be helpful to you, you can come to Foundry and request counselling Monday to Friday from 12:00PM-5:00PM *closed on Stat holidays, and during the week between Christmas and New Years Day.

Primary Care Services (Health Care)

• Primary care with physicians is offered on a walk-in, first-come first-serve bases and due to high demand can fill up very quickly. If you’d like to connect to a physician, please call or attend Foundry Prince George promptly at 11:00AM.
• A physician is here Monday, Tuesday & Thursday from 2:30PM-5:00PM   
• A Registered Nurse with certified practice is on daily from 11:00AM-5:00PM. Nurses can help with a number of things so feel free to visit during this time.  If the nurse can’t do everything you need, your information will be gathered and passed on to the doctor.
• You may not be aware, but as a Registered Nurse with certified practice can help with:
  – Birth control information and distribution;
  – Safe Sex Practices: Information and free safe sex tools;
  – Sexually Transmitted Infection testing and treatment;
  – Pregnancy testing and counselling on options for you if your test is positive;
  – Flu Shots and other Immunizations;
  – Overdose Prevention Kits (Naloxone): She can teach you how to use it and send you home with one;
  – Dressing changes and wound care;
  – Harm reduction strategies and support

Gender Affirming Care

• Gender affirming care is the delivery of equitable and accessible wholistic healthcare supporting trans people.

Mental Health and Substance Use Services

• Our walk-in counselling is available Monday to Friday, 12:00PM-5:00PM
• The first time you meet with a Foundry Counsellor, they will explore what is challenging you, why you came in and what you need in order to get a clear understanding of how best to support you.  Remember that the more honest you are with us about what is happening and what you are thinking, the more we can help!
• We want you to decide on your plan, we are here to simply provide you with options. Your plan may include checking out some great and reliable stuff online, returning for more counselling, or accessing more of our services at Foundry and/or connecting you with some of the other great services available to you in Prince George.
• Our Nurse can support you with harm reduction strategies, Opioid Agonist Therapy, or referrals to other services in and out of our region.
• Our Peer Supporters can provide you with non-judgmental social support, from a place of lived experience or understanding. They can help you seek out healthy activities and opportunities, provide compassionate listening, and help you meet other social determinants of health.

Family and Caregiver Support

• We agree with Family Smart (www.familysmart.ca); whether you’re a natural support or an assigned caregiver, young people do better when the adults who care about them are supported.
• Parent Peer Supporters with lived experience loving, caring for, and supporting a young person on their journey as they improved their mental health are available at Foundry on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Fridays. Call Foundry to get connected to our of our Parent Peer Supporters.
• Family Involvement Support can help you navigate complex systems, help you grow your skills as your young persons’ emotion coach, offer compassionate listening, or help you understand the transformative power of attachment. Call Foundry to connect with our Family Involvement Worker.
• Groups such as SMART Recovery Friends & Family, EFFT Caregiver Workshops, An Introduction to Emotion Coaching, and Circle of Security regularly offered by the Foundry Family and Caregiver Support Team.

Come in and see us about your needs. If we don’t have it yet, we will help discover options with you.

Our partnering programs include:

• Northern Health
• Intersect Youth & Family Services Society
• Ministry of Children and Family Development
• Prince George Native Friendship Centre
• Prince George Division of Family Practice
• Services to Adults with Developmental Disabilities
• The Ministry of Social Development and Poverty Reduction
• School District 57
• First Nations Health Authority
• Justice Education Society/ Communities Against the Sexual Exploitation of Youth
• Youth Forensic Psychiatric Services
• Options for Sexual Health
• Foundry Family Advisory
• Qmunity
• Family Smart
• Central Interior Native Health
• Foundry Youth Action Committee

Lead Agency