Dr. Jennifer Hensel is now working with a patient advisory committee to understand who benefits the most from virtual crisis mental health care and why
Dr. Jennifer Hensel: “With this research grant, we are trying to understand who is benefiting the most from virtual services and determining who is best suited for them.”
Within just three weeks of Manitoba’s first reported case of COVID-19 in March 2020, HSC psychiatrist Dr. Jennifer Hensel led the Crisis Response Services team at HSC in implementing a range of virtual care solutions. Notably, she worked with colleagues to establish the virtual Crisis Stabilization Unit (vCSU), which has proven instrumental in providing crisis mental health care to patients in the comfort of their homes.
Dr. Hensel’s donor-funded study, “An Innovative Virtual Mental Health Crisis Stabilization Unit: Evaluation of Patient-Centered Outcomes,” aims to discover why virtual services like the vCSU have helped some patients more than others and hopes to use those findings to improve service delivery and potentially benefit all patients who seek mental health care at HSC Winnipeg.
“I’ve always been somebody interested in research and evaluation. I’ve always enjoyed the numbers and other data, and what we can learn from them and where we can improve. Ultimately, mental health care is a rewarding field with lots to learn,” says Dr. Hensel.
The concept of providing comprehensive health care services virtually to patients at home has significantly expedited and expanded care options for those facing mental health crises. Dr. Hensel emphasizes: “Virtual care brings health care directly into the day-to-day of people’s lives, allowing individuals to benefit in new and innovative ways.”
Working with a patient advisory committee comprising patients who have personally been the recipients of virtual mental health crisis care, Dr. Hensel is designing a comprehensive research and evaluation study conducted entirely virtually.
“We are meeting a need we didn’t know we had until the pandemic. With this research grant, we are trying to understand who is benefiting the most from virtual services and determining who is best suited for them,” says Dr. Hensel.
Dr. Hensel is grateful for the support of HSC Foundation donors, and firmly believes that donors are helping create opportunities that wouldn’t otherwise exist.
This year, the HSC Foundation, with the generous support of its donors, invested over $305,000 in health care research.
Learn more about Dr. Hensel’s study and the other research projects funded by 2023 grants by visiting our 2023 Grants Recipients page.
