Improving youth mental wellness services in an Indigenous context in Ulukhaktok, Northwest Territories: ACCESS Open Minds Project.

Aim: To describe a community-specific and culturally coherent approach to youth mental health services in a small and remote northern Indigenous community in Canada's Northwest Territories, under the framework of ACCESS Open Minds (ACCESS OM), a pan-Canadian youth mental health research and evaluation network.

Methods: As 1 of the 14 Canadian communities participating in a 5-year, federally funded service transformation and evaluation project, the arctic Inuit community of Ulukhaktok has undertaken culturally relevant adjustments in their delivery of youth mental wellness services and related community wellness initiatives. These enhancement activities highlight connections to culture and traditional skills, honour youth- and community-expressed desires to incorporate Inuvialuit-specific approaches to wellness, and strengthen the support systems to improve access to mainstream mental healthcare, when needed.