Children's mental health services have collapsed

[noblegiraffe]

www.theguardian.com/society/2021/jul/18/nhs-is-failing-half-of-young-people-with-mental-health-issues

"Data published by NHS Digital shows that in 2019-20 – the most recent figures available – 23% of the 547,590 under-18s referred to NHS mental health, learning disability and autism services had no contact from health workers to deliver care, nor meetings between health workers to support their care. Another 26% – 144,384 people – had their referrals closed without receiving treatment."

The shocking thing is that this involves data from before the pandemic. We know that the situation is even worse now, with children who have been badly affected by lockdown joining the queue, and children who have been unable to access their regular support now reaching crisis point.

I recently got a letter from Nadine Dorries, the Minister for suicide prevention and mental health and she said that more money was being put into children's mental health services and that a lot of responsibility is being passed to schools to have a senior mental health lead (as if we don't have enough on our plate).

They've also appointed a Youth Mental Health Ambassador.

Nadine appears to have deleted her twitter account today, so I'm guessing she was getting some unwelcome feedback on a recent claim that CAMHS was "well-resourced and robust."

It's absolutely shocking that children have to have actively attempted suicide to access support and even then simply be added to a waiting list.

Agreed.

And again it creates a divide where the kids of the wealthy can afford private counselling/therapy etc and those who can’t afford it don’t get any support

My 12 year old attempted suicide. Took four months to even be seen (remotely). Despite another two referrals to camhs and other escalating issues.

People don't want to train to work in mental health, and children's mental health is a speciality within that. Even if they were to throw money at it things wouldn't improve quickly, there aren't even enough staff to work agency for the big bucks and incentives for trainees won't help much as so many people leave. It needs rebuilding from the foundations up.

That's awful, Pantene and must have been so distressing for you. I hope she is getting support now.

It's always been like this. I couldn't access help for ds1 (adhd) starting 2004 and was still struggling 12 years later. Just gave up and had to go private with ds2 (autism).

That's true about the divide, User, I know people who have borrowed money to get private support for their kids. Others just simply won't have that option at all.

Interesting that no one wants to train in mental health, Note, what do you think would need to happen to make it work?

Yup I agree noble. Friend’s daughter had to attempt /talk about suicide and attend A&E several times before finally getting to see someone. She was 11...

The emotional drain of working in mental health is crippling. I work in mental health part time and part time training mental health practitioners.
You are treated as a robot. Back in the good old days you had time to seek support from colleagues after hearing the distressing stories from patients. Not any more- there's an expectation that you will see patients back to back, with tokenisation 'support'. My team is great, but we struggle.
There's also the unrealistic expectations that mental health services can fix everything- we can't. We can't fix societal problems that can lead to mental health problems. Sometimes we can't do what we are trained to do due to wading through the other crap thrown at us.
Mental health services are buckling because of privatisation. Money is going to those who own the businesses- the clinicians are paid by number of people they see, which leads to burn out and people leaving. There is money in the system, it's just being used ineffectively.
I really feel for kids and families who are referred to CAMHS, and I say that as a parent of a child who has had to seek support from CAMHS

It's horrible, Jan. I know others in the same situation.

And children who have been told that CAMHS won't deal with them because they are autistic, even though they also have mental health issues.

Just seen on twitter "Referrals to CAMHS in March 2021 were more than double the number in March 2020"

and they weren't even anywhere near coping then.

I have found part of the problem with childrens mental health services is the desperation to pass it on to any other service so they have to pay for it as everyone is so stretched. We bounced between the GP, the school and the cahms. My son attends a special school with its own counsellor and there is still a lot of school saying cahms should do it and cahms saying school should do it and whilst they argue he gets no support.

The journalist who wrote the Observer article has a twitter thread where they detail further stories that they didn't have space to include in their article.

twitter.com/cjayanetti/status/1416711307269660675?s=21

I remember calling the crisis team when DS was 9, their response was “hide all medication and sharp things, we should have an appointment in the next few months”

It is a system that is in no way fit for purpose

@MildredPuppy

I have found part of the problem with childrens mental health services is the desperation to pass it on to any other service so they have to pay for it as everyone is so stretched. We bounced between the GP, the school and the cahms. My son attends a special school with its own counsellor and there is still a lot of school saying cahms should do it and cahms saying school should do it and whilst they argue he gets no support.

Yes!

Everything gets passed back to the community peadiatrian or school in our case

I’m sorry to say it’s hardly news!

It bloody should be, don't you think?

Yep. Totally shit. Has been a long while.

DD was referred during May last year. We are still waiting.

Luckily we have other routes to get her support, but really we shouldn't have had to use them, and they were hard to navigate to.

If she had been able to get help when first referred she maybe wouldn't have got worse for 7 months before starting a very slow and bumpy recovery.

Over a year, Teen?

Young Minds are running a campaign to fund early support hubs. You put in your details and it generates an email to your MP.

youngminds.org.uk/get-involved/campaign-with-us/fund-the-hubs/

I don't know what else to do.

Yep. CAMHS recommended a local counsellor for £50 a hour or a charity that only provides 6 sessions.
They did tell me to hide all the knives and make sure I know where she is at all times (basic stuff for anyone parenting a challenging teen).

My GP has chased them up so we'll see if they come back with anything useful in a few months time.

Yes, over a year.
She's not self harming or suicidal so not a priority.
She was unable to return to school, missed all of y11, incredibly anxious about germs, now on antidepressants, but not bad enough to be a priority.

And I have no life.
And it looks like I can't go on our holiday (by ferry) delayed from last year because she is too anxious to go.

That's shit, Teen, so difficult for you. You must be so angry that she didn't get support early enough.

In my opinion even the so called professionals are inept at dealing with young people's mental health issues.
We need more people who have actually experienced the likes of anxiety and panic disorders and learnt how to manage and overcome it to work in this profession. Not someone half heartedly attempting some kind of CBT that apparently only has 17 percent success rate.
Our poor children don't stand a chance, it's truly shocking.