philanthropyOz Blog

Massive grant for leading youth mental health research centre

It was announced today that the Colonial Foundation will be providing a massive $17 million over five years to the ORYGEN Research Centre, bringing the Colonial Foundation’s total support to $30 million since seeding ORYGEN’s creation in 2002. Headed by Professor Patrick McGorry, the ORYGEN team has developed a service model which has received international acclaim. Key parts of the model have been implemented in Canada, the UK and New York, and ORYGEN has also been instrumental in the establishment of headspace, the new federally-funded National Youth Mental Health Foundation.

An eight-year study of early intervention in youth mental health disorders has also revealed that ORYGEN’s model is delivering a higher recovery rate at roughly half the cost of standard public mental health services. Individuals experiencing the ORYGEN program had more positive global outcomes, less severe psychotic symptoms and and a higher level of global functioning. The economic findings have also been replicated internationally. The findings of the study will be presented to the World Congress of the international health Economics Association in Denmark next week.

The Colonial Foundation grant to ORYGEN Youth Health represents one of the largest philanthropic grants made to health research in Australia, and will be used to further ORYGEN’s effective and unique work. For more information, a media release is available on ORYGEN’s website.