Can CAMHS do this?

[tallywag]

DS has been waiting for a referral to CAMHS for a long time. Has finally got an appointment and they have said that he will be offered CBT. But now they say they cannot give any indication at all when it might be? CAMHS manager can't even offer a ball park figure of whether it will be months or years. Which I think is pretty rubbish to be honest. It feels like he is just being put on hold until he ages out of the system. Is there any other way I can find out the length of the waiting lists for our area? Aren't they all supposed to have service targets or something? Thanks.

The waitings lists are long. And the team leads can’t tell you how long because they simply don’t know.
Clinicians can’t pick up new work until they finish and discharge someone else.
Try school, or private. Do you have CASY in your area? Here in Nottinghamshire we signpost to nottalone.org.uk/ take a look and see if there’s something sim in your area.

Also, rightly or wrongly, those who shout loudest do often get seen sooner.

How old is your son?. I was told that as my child is 17 they will try and see them before 18 if they are assessed as needing help but the local adult mental health service does also see children from age 16 plus and we can self refer there. Cahms also do handovers to that service as a child gets to 18 if they need ongoing support.
In the meanwhile we are accessing private CBT.

I work in Camhs. Waiting lists vary and change over time depending on many factors - funding, staffing, room availability. Our biggest challenge is recruitment - we have been given additional money but can’t get CBT therapists into post.

The NHS won’t give ball park waiting times because we just can’t say to to reasons outlined above, and we get people ringing to complain.

We also can’t recruit into posts, we have several counselling and CBT roles out and just can’t fill them.

I believe there are something like 90,000 unfilled posts across the NHS nationally.

There are other services at a lower level than Camhs that you could explore while waiting. Bear in mind some won't accept you if you're waiting for Camhs as they'll argue if Camhs has accepted you you need a specific level of support
But you could contact your council and see if they have a children's well-being service - this is more specialised than what school nurses can offer but not as specialise as Camhs. Sometimes you have to go via early help to self refer which puts some people off as irs similar to referring to social services but many areas have specially trained staff
Also many schools have mental health teams (educational mental health and practitioners) that are nhs staff- it's a new role so won't be all schools but it's worth looking into .

@Twospaniels

Also, rightly or wrongly, those who shout loudest do often get seen sooner.

This is what concerns me. Our DD has been waiting for four years to have a formal assessment, I do wonder how far we’ve been pushed back because others get angry and loud.

We fully accept the issues in CAMHS, so will never get angry at staff as that’s not helpful.

What are you waiting for camhs FOR? MH? Anxiety? Counselling? ASD diagnosis?

Can you phone back, or better email and say you want to be seen /assessed? Rather than just fobbed off with CBT.

Email. complain. Speak to your GP.

I think it depends on your area and what you need them for. I don’t really have any complaints regarding in our area.

My DD was originally referred for CBT 18 months ago. We gave up waiting and found her a private therapist. She still hasn’t made it to the top of the CBT waiting list.

She was, however, subsequently referred for Habit Reversal Therapy back in August and is about to start that next week so I guess it depends on what you’re waiting for, the demand and what therapists they have available.

I’ve found locally they’re pretty good. We’ve not had to wait long for any assessments and regular check ins from them while we were on the waiting list for CBT. We kept being pushed from pillar to post between Neurology and CAMHS (for DD’s neurological condition) and CAMHS have been great, although their hands are tied with what they can do to help - appointments made quickly for things they could help with, they liaised with neurology for us as we kept hitting a brick wall.

They’re massively busy, short staffed and overwhelmed

Are there any local charities you can be referred to? Here YMCA, Barnardos, etc all offer some therapies in the first instance and then send you back to CAMHS if they’re not helpful/enough but you don’t lose your place on the CAMHS waiting list if you see what I mean.

I’m sure there are 1 or 2 qualified, sensible and hard working people who work for CAMHS.

In all my years dealing with them, they’ve been an absolute shower of shite.

How old is he and how long has he been waiting since the referral was made? It depends on the LA, what his condition is and how “severe” his condition is. Unfortunately children’s MH services are underfunded

i've worked with children and young people who have active referrals to camhs- some practitioners are excellent, some less so- just like any profession-

overall i'd say camhs are under resourced (not the same as being under funded) and generally not fit for purpose-

many young people who should be in the service - whether receiving assessment, therapy or at worst an in-patient bed, are languishing on waiting lists and getting progressively worse-

i'd say its pretty much the same in adult mh services- overall too few resources for the people who need them,

the money that's wasted in this country, when services are breaking, truly makes my heart bleed

@Hen2018

I’m sure there are 1 or 2 qualified, sensible and hard working people who work for CAMHS.

In all my years dealing with them, they’ve been an absolute shower of shite.

I work for a specialist area of Camhs (not generic) and prior to joining this team had been in other nhs areas for seven years. I genuinely have never worked with harder working people. Sadly it is very short staffed and over stretched even more so post covid and we often have no applicants for jobs at all and we are having to work so much overtime with so few staff. It's very worrying and I totally understand the nightmare it must be for families but I just want to say the staff I work with work very hard and are so committed.

CAHMS didnt work for us, their techniques were disapointing, apparently CBT has a very low success rate.
In the end l followed my gut feeling and homeschooled my teenage son, and spent years researching anxiety and panic, we never looked back, but l got the impression from CAHMs that they didnt really approve that route.
Hes now done his exams and working part time, so we got there in the end, but the lack of help and support is utterly appalling.

Whoever said it helps to shout is right. We shouted, emailed, bothered and annoyed. If you don't stick your head above the parapet you'll wait a very long time.

We managed to get DD into a specialist teaching facility and get CAMHS help. The help she's having is deteriorating though... her psychiatrist is always off for personal reasons and there is no one to take over.
I'd gladly throw money at the situation, but the nearest private child psychiatrist to us is 2.5 hours away and has a waiting list so long she's not accepting anyone else on it.

Do you not feel guilty about bullying your way to the front of the queue for your child? Why is yours more important than other children already waiting?

We have had help from school as part of SENCO but there’s only so much they can do without the formal assessment.

We are still waiting (after nearly four years) and it’s very difficult, but it is wrong to force your way ahead by harassing staff.

My GP referred my DS, they refused to see him as he wasn’t suicidal, we went private in the end.

I cant afford private sadly.

@Stellaris22

Do you not feel guilty about bullying your way to the front of the queue for your child? Why is yours more important than other children already waiting?

We have had help from school as part of SENCO but there’s only so much they can do without the formal assessment.

We are still waiting (after nearly four years) and it’s very difficult, but it is wrong to force your way ahead by harassing staff.

Stellaris I wouldn't say that I bullied anyone to get my daughter the support she needed. I wrote a polite email with support from PALS pointing out how ludicrous the situation was. Dd had a PMHW allocated who had no knowledge or experience of ASD (dd had been diagnosed at two years old so it wasn't an insignificant part of who she is), when dd couldn't access what she offered and was getting more and more unwell the PMHW proposed to discharge her. In what other area of medicine would that be considered the correct course of action? Once she was given the correct support and more importantly CAMHS wrote in support of her placement in an independent specialist school then dd began to get better and because her school has their own therapists dd was subsequently discharged from CAMHS. The alternative and one I wouldn't stand for was that dd was discharged, be out of education and her life not only severely restricted also at risk.

I don’t feel bad about shouting re my children. My son was “accidentally” discharged whilst waiting, then told they didn’t deal with self hatred from being gay,. He had an appalling assessment. A 10 year old could have done better. Then after months off school he was left languishing in bed suicidal with nothing, then put on anti ds with no counselling…..Why on earth wouldn’t you complain. I complained to PALs and got a manager take him on. Not ideal.He finally got the treatment he needed a few months before being discharged to adult services because his suicidal intent was getting worrying.. Being treated by Cahms does not mean you get what you need. Far from it. There is too much gate keeping from expertise and being given lower qualified staff. It’s so reactionary and frankly a disgrace that it isn’t being more widely reported.

I.work as a nurse practitioner in a GP and we dont even bother referring to them anymore.

We manage issues between school nurses and ourselves.

If there’s a waiting list, there’s a waiting list. You can’t magic (or complain) it away. Go private.

@Letsallscreamatthesistene

I.work as a nurse practitioner in a GP and we dont even bother referring to them anymore.

We manage issues between school nurses and ourselves.

If someone has been waiting four years is it worth assuming you'll never get help from CAMHS and just go back to your GP then?

I get letters saying we are still on the list and apologies for the delay, plus our school is thankfully quite helpful. We've had an ADHD specialist observe her at school and they said she is showing all the signs, it's just that CAMHS are the best Bly ones who can formally diagnose it.

I am extremely worried about the effect it's having on her education, but I don't see why those who are the most vocal get preferential treatment.

CAMHS were absolutely awful with my son who suffers from body focused repetitive behaviours. They asked if he was being bullied about it, he said no so they wrote a social story about a boy with body focused repetitive behaviours who was being bullied which luckily I intercepted. We paid for him to see someone privately and whilst we could only afford 6 sessions those sessions did more for him than camhs have ever managed to do.

@stellaris22 really depends if your GPs are willing to manage it, and how they work with school nurses