To think CHAMS is shit

[shockandawe]

To not even see my ds, and close the referral without even meeting us.

I really fee like not sending my ds to senior school in September. He has such noticeable tics that I really fear the issue will be a whole lot worse once at secondary.

Aibu? Don't mind to hear if I am.

I'm also a CAMHS practitioner.

People need to understand that it is not CAMHS that ultimately decides what services they provide or what client groups they do or do not see, - that is decided by area health Commissioning board which is made up of GPs and others and is not part of CAMHS.
So if your local CAMHS service does not offer a service for children with ASD - for example - it's because the commissioners do not allow them to and do not provide the budget for it.
Different commissioning groups in different areas have different priorities for spending hence post code lottery for services.

If you want your local CAMHS services to be providing services that they are not then you need to speak to your area health commissioners.

I agree with yorkshapudding the only way engagement is used within CAMHS is when families don't turn up in repeated appointments (which happens very very often)

I've not read all the responses to this op, just wanted to let you know you're not on your own, we've had 2 horrendous experiences with CAMHS, one 10 years ago, with DS2, ex perm baby with a whole list of issues, including global developmental delay, feeding issues, growth issues, behaviour issues, eventually added autism to the list of diagnosis. Basically were given advice which was tantamount to "abusive" it left me feeling that my children would be better off putting my kids up for adoption.

All his issues according to the therapist were obviously to do with my 'issues' & nothing at all to do with his special needs (I am a qualified Nursery Nurse, Social Worker, & have a work background of working with children from birth to adulthood, in various settings, including children with differing needs & abilities). I was really struggling to know how to keep a non-verbal whirlwind safe & had turned to them in the hope they could provide some strategies or something to help make life easier.

Once I got angry & I complained, I was told by the manager, that the advice I'd been given was abusive.

When I spoke to other parent & professionals who had, had dealings with this one particular practitioner, it appeared she was well known for her responses to parents ie mother of a tube fed child was told, his feeding issues were obviously to do with her "eating issues" - despite the fact the child had a cleft lip & pallet, plus oral aversion, because when he took in orally came out via his nose, plus severe learning issues & mum didn't actually have any food issues. Even the Health Visitor said "oh no you didn't see her did you"

Again last year when dealing with DS1 who has ASD & Dyspraxia & was depressed, because he was struggling with the pressures of 6th form - despite several conversations with them, & a face to face assessment they decided he wasn't their responsibility & needed level 2 input (which he'd already had) & referred him to an organisation that wouldn't touch him, because he was medicated - which made him automatically a level 3 service ie CAMHS.

When we eventually after lots of arguing Got to see a Psychiatrist he saw took no notice of what he was being told by myself or school & decided that all DS needed was a girlfriend!

If only it was that easy!

So we've given up!

"Better off if I put them up for adoption, because it was all my fault" sorry!

That's where I'm at.

CAMHS in our area is so severely underfunded it is (IMO) no longer fit for purpose.

I work for a community counselling agency supposedly working with young people who need some support but are not seriously mentally ill. What is happening now is that because the wait for CAMHS can be more than two years the local A&E routinely refers failed suicide attempts to our agency where the wait is only about 10 weeks. And we can only keep the wait to that time by only offering 12 week contracts. That may well be better than nothing for some people, but for many it is woefully inadequate and might actually make things worse.

Underfunded, woefully inadequate, not able to help.
All of that I can perhaps deal with.
Blatant lies, less so.

Any CAHMS worker want to explain to me why you'd give a 14yr old who has taken at least one overdose, her own medication, one of the side effects being suicidal feelings without telling her parent?

Also when you've seen her lamp her own parent in the face, you'd say it didn't happen?

Why, why?

Here this was published yesterday. Relevant to what we are discussing

www.theguardian.com/society/2016/apr/11/mental-health-services-turn-away-23-of-under-18s-referred-to-them

If you want your local CAMHS services to be providing services that they are not then you need to speak to your area health commissioners.

Do you not think parents have done this? We have complained / written letters to everyone we can think of commissioners, MP's, head of children's services etc etc. We sign every petition, we complete every survey about the woeful lack of provision. We have spent the last four years doing this. But do you know what we are now defeated. Totally and utterly defeated.

We are too OneInEight.

Basically what the article says is 100% true. We see families usually when the problems are so entrenched and longstanding that loads of input is needed, often including more than one professionals or services. The idea that some 'strategies' will cut it is a total illusion!! There are no such 'strategies' that work consistently when you've got problems to deal with that you haven't seen at the early intervention stage and see much further down the line. You've got the child's resistance to deal with, the parents' fixed views and understandable disappointment in the system and all the hoops they've had to go through. Then they deal with you as if you're some kind of magician or fixer who can throw some strategies at them or some medication and that'll deal with it. Only it doesn't work that way!! Strategies are all that well and you can in fact find them online or in books, they're not rocket science. What's really hard is to deal with the reality that entrenched, longstanding problems need 'entrenched' longstanding work, sometimes multi agency and there is simply no provision for that. Whenever I've had the chance to work a case as I think I should i.e to see an adolescent, say, for as long as they need, and not to rush it, the results are what make my job so rewarding. They can truly change beyond recognition--and children / adolescents do change, given the chance. But most often NOT in 6 sessions or with the parents massively against you as the system has failed them too many times.

And don't get me started on IAPT.

Like shiney our experience now is with tier 4 Camhs and has been mostly amazing. But I wonder if we would have got here if early intervention had been available.
However tier 3 Camhs also was clearly doing their best under very difficult/stretched circumstances - we had a crisis plan, a number to call, were able to access emergency help on the phone, as well as the appointments.
Now my dc attends a hospital day unit, accesses education there as well as intensive therapies. There's no magic wand and it will take a long time working with my dc but I do feel we and dx are listened to, understood, supported and helped, which has made a huge difference to quality of life for the whole family.

stillloving I find this quite patronising.

Well I find your response quite patronising too, so we're equal.

I find it very hard to believe that there would be clinicians who would force their views on the families.

Have you read the thread? Also please see adult services.

And they may not force their view - just discharge people who won't agree with them about everything... "not engaging" being given as the reason.

Our local camhs are undoubtedly stretched but they are seemingly doing their best with the limited resources. I left a message for our camhs nurse yesterday, she phoned me today and we have started a plan to try to sort things.

It's like so many things though and a postcode lottery which is the problem.

Elementofsurprise I'm not sure what you find patronising about my response. I wasn't sarcastic (which you were); I clarified what I see happening every day as a CAMHS professional. I have the right the share my own view as of course you have the right to share yours. The idea that a CAMHS clinician will close a case just because a family 'does not agree with him / her' and to name that 'not engaging' is beyond anything I can imagine happening. 'Non engagement' by the way has specific criteria as does closing a case, we don't just close cases on a whim, randomly! This is all checked by our line managers etc.

I know adult services are very stretched.

I know also that there's a wide difference in quality between clinicians.

And finally there are different clinicians that may suit a family better or worse and on a daily basis I hear families switching to a different clinician or type of treatment, that's completely ok and that's why CAMHS is multidisciplinary

stilllovingmysleep It's very simple. I find it patronising to be told "Oh, that wouldn't happen" when my own experience and that of posters here is that it does happen.

My post was only mildly sarcastic, and mainly dark humour because that is the only way I survive with the horrific experiences I have had when I've needed help. Disagreeing with anything or even pointing out mistakes and discrepancies really gets professionals backs up. I'm glad you are not one of those professionals - but I bet if you were a fly on the wall you'd discover some of your colleagues are!

DD went from not needing support to weekly sessions, a CAF, Support at school, a professionals meeting without her Dad & I, implied FII, to nothing not even a follow up - all in the space of 10 months

CAMHS tore our family apart & left us to put it back together - DD still shuts down when we go past the building

"Not engaging" - In our area it seems to be ok to base this on one appointment where the child participated and answered the questions (no missed appointments as this was the only one). At the receiving end it does feel like a "tick box" way of managing an excessive workload. The child is seen and immediately discharged = job done, statistics on the number of patients seen appear acceptable.

I think that as CAMHS is so different across the country it's probably hard for workers in the better functioning places to accept how bad things can be. Parents can come across as dismissive/aggressive/paranoid (delete as applicable) not because this is our typical mindset but because we have had horrendous experiences at times when our dc were at their most vulnerable.

It seems to be more easily accepted that there are cases where some medical, education and social care staff fall way short of what might reasonably expected from them. Why is it so difficult to include CAMHS workers in this list? I accept it's not all of them. Sadly, locally I have only heard negative feedback but I hope that someone, somewhere in my area has had a good experience of this service.

In our area they are officially shit. We received an apology yesterday from CAMHS for the poor service we have received over the last 18 months. No work done at all. Furthermore it turns out our new practioner, as our last one has gone on maternity leave, is actually one who's on long term sick leave. Do you think they are trying to avoid us? The incompetence is breath taking. It makes me cross they get paid.

stilllovingmysleep our 2nd case was closed because the TW retired, when he told me that he was retiring I asked who our case was being handed over to his reply was "it won't be, if you want to continue you will have to get another referral through your GP"