Inclusion Criteria:

• (1) receiving outpatient psychiatric clinic services through the St. Joseph's Care Group Lakehead Psychiatric Hospital in the Community Mental Health Services program, Thunder Bay, Ontario or at the Regional Mental Health Care, Specialized Adult Service, London, Ontario 2) 18-65 years of age; 3) chronic moderate to severe mental illness - all scores below severe or very severe rating on the Threshold Assessment Grid; 4) duration of mental illness of at least 2 years; 5) not regularly receiving psychiatric or mental health care from another family physician, and; 6)capable of understanding the nature of the project and can give consent.

Exclusion Criteria:

• Clients will be excluded if at the time of recruitment they:

  1. have an unstable mental illness;
  2. had a psychiatric hospitalization admission within the last past 6 months;
  3. used crisis intervention within the past 6 months (requiring subsequent contact greater than once per week);
  4. had a history of self-harm over the past 6 months;
  5. had a history of harm to others over the past 6 months;
  6. had drug and alcohol problems over the past 6 months that would contribute significantly to clinical destabilization;
  7. have unmet major psychosocial needs (including homelessness and marked poverty), and;
  8. are experiencing a serious medical illness that is unstable and that contributes to instability of mental illness.