Professionals

• CAMHS advice line for all agencies
• Training courses for professionals on key issues with safeguarding children's and young people's mental health.
• An integrated CAMHS provision delivering evidence-based pathways and outcome focussed measures.
• Group Therapy and individual psychological therapy.
• Support to vulnerable groups including young people with a learning disability, looked after children, youth offending service and pupil referral units where there is an identified mental health need.
• Support for universal services.
• Care and support through transition to adult services where needed.
• Specialist Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) assessment in partnership with other services.

This service is available 7 days a week, between 8:40am and 7pm, 365 days a year, with a range of multi-disciplinary practitioners accessible within these hours. Outside these hours, cover is provided for emergency advice and crises via an on-call system. The service is not a stand-alone service but an extension of Core CAMHS Service thereby supporting continuity of care where possible for the child, young person and family and enabling an effective step up, step down model. The service works to maintain the child or young person in their ‘home’ setting and works closely with local Accident and Emergency services, Adult Crisis Intervention Services and the Duty Team within Children’s services.

Typically children and young people accessing this service will have one or more of the following:

• Severe depression/emotional disorders
• Newly presenting or acute untreated psychosis
• Imminent risk of suicide or a history of serious self- harm.

The service is available for:

• Children and young people meeting the criteria for moderate to severe mental health problems as a minimum requirement.
• Those whose mental health needs and emotional disturbance are to such a degree that the level of risk the young person poses cannot be contained by core community mental health service alone, but support by a specialist community service could provide an alternative to admission to inpatient services.
• Those whose deterioration in mental state and functioning renders them liable for admission to an inpatient unit.
• Those requiring discharge from an acute inpatient service following an episode of care.
• Children and young people requiring an intensive acute care pathway.
• A primary diagnosis of an eating disorder where the young person needs an acute intervention in relation to the complexity of risk, mental illness (e.g.Depression) and/or low BMI requiring emergency intervention.

CAMHS Crisis Team will respond to a crisis referral by phone within 2 hours and see the young person for a face to face contact within 24 hours for an emergency and within 5 days for an urgent assessment.

Children in care generally have greater health needs than their peers; the CAMHS Review 2008 stated that “nearly 50% of children in care have a diagnosable mental health disorder, compared with 10% of the general population.

We offer support and containment to Looked After Children presenting with emotional and behavioural difficulties. We assist in maintaining placement stability and promoting emotional wellbeing by providing a psychological understanding of the young person’s needs to all involved in their care.

The LAC mental health team consists of two part-time clinical psychologists and a part-time mental health practitioner. 

We offer support to children and young people up to 18 years old who are looked after by the local authority presenting with low mood, anxiety, obsessive behaviours, relationship/attachment difficulties, anger/aggression, self-harming behaviours, and low self-esteem.

Support is offered in one or several of the ways listed below:

• Individual therapeutic support for young people: including play therapy, attachment-based therapies, cognitive behavioural therapies, counselling, self-esteem work and talking therapy.
• Consultation, advice and support to professionals/carers involved in young people’s lives.
• Training to foster carers and adoptive parents. Training focuses on the attachment difficulties displayed by looked after children, including strategies for managing these issues.
• Training for residential home staff; providing a psychological understanding of the children/young people in their residential care.
• Psychological assessments of children and young people, looked after children and those in adoptive placements to inform future support/decision making.
• Support in coordinating the transition from child to adult mental health services for those reaching 18 years

We have a dedicated member of staff who works to support students from the pupil referral unit.

Our learning disability team is made up of a clinical psychologist and a part-time mental health practitioner, with support from an assistant psychologist.

We offer support to children and young people up to18 years old who have a moderate, severe, or profound learning disability as well as for those with profound and multiple learning disabilities.

To access our service the young person would also need to be presenting with evidence of a mental health difficulty, including but not limited to; low mood, anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder or self-injurious behaviour linked to mental health difficulty.

Our team offers one to one work if appropriate but will also work with parents, carers and schools as needed. Joint clinics are run with paediatrics in order to help identify those who need mental health support early and regular consultation takes place with local special schools in order to support their pupils. We also offer an advice line for parents and professionals. To access this, please call 01472 252570 and ask for the learning disabilities team.