About Us
Since 1967, as an initially modest outreach of a concerned group of community leaders, the Distress Centres of Toronto has provided 24-hour telephone support. Hundreds of thousands of calls later, this agency continues to offer round the clock response to those experiencing emotional distress or in need of crisis intervention and suicide prevention. We also provide face to face support and counseling to people dealing with the effects of suicide and homicide.
Some other things you may not have known about the Distress Centres of Toronto:
- We have 600 volunteers at three locations (Downtown, North Toronto and Scarborough)
- We respond to approximately 100,000 calls each year on the Distress Centres of Toronto telephone lines.
- More than half of our calls are received after hours and on weekends, when other services are closed.
- We provide consultation and outreach to other organizations across Ontario on suicide prevention.
- We provide a Resource Library accessible to families, volunteers, staff and interested members of the community.
- Through our face-to-face Survivor Support Programme, we counsel 500 families and friends annually who are suffering from the pain of bereavement caused by suicide.
- We provide assistance, in person, to persons dealing with a homicidal death through our Homicide Bereavement Programme.
We are a United Way Member Agency.
Our Mission Statement
The mission of the Distress Centres of Toronto is to provide emotional support, crisis intervention and suicide prevention to those who request our services. We do this by:
- providing a confidential service available 24 hours a day to persons in distress;
- ensuring all residents of our rapidly changing, culturally diverse city are aware of our services;
- providing suicide postvention and emotional support to people dealing with the effects of suicide;
- providing bereavement counseling to people dealing with the effects of homicide;
- developing new programs as needed;
- collaborating with and assisting the growth of complementary organizations;
- providing consultation, education and training to develop a deeper understanding within the community of the issues faced by our clients.
