Young Person and Parent/Carer Participation and Engagement with CAMHS in Haringey
Download (PDF 1.44 MB)Summary of report content
Healthwatch Haringey carried out several engagement events, with young people aged 9-18 years old, parents and mental health service providers. This is to gather their views on the access barriers to child and adolescent mental health services. The engagement events included interviews, focus groups and a parents’ survey. The engagement events were held in March 2016.
The work was done as part of a Healthwatch engagement programme on child and adolescent mental health services.
The report identified key issues. There are barriers to engagement with young people so they can access mental health support. Access to psychological services is difficult and acts as a barrier to engaging with young people who may need mental health support. The lack of suitable communication channels, such as youth forum or groups, makes it difficult for service providers to engage with young people. Young people prefer digital engagement and face-to-face engagement more than surveys. School engagement was highlighted as a very important base for engagement. The referral pathway from the school to mental health services is not clear. Parents felt involved in their child’s referral and assessment stage, but not once the delivery of the service has started. Parents and carers felt strong that senior managers were not engaging directly with them to facilitate decision-making for mental health support. For example, senior managers do not usually attend service user/carer/parents board meetings, in order to listen to their feedback directly.
The report made several recommendations. the following are some of the recommendations highlighted in the original report:
- Young people and parents/carers should be made fully aware of what engagement activities are available and what to expect
- Young people should be made aware that they are free to engage or not with the system.
- Engagement must be tailored around individuals and be flexible, such as interviews, online focus groups and so on. Young people should be made aware that confidentiality is observed. Services should respect and understand the potential value of confidential feedback through all formats of engagement.
- Outcomes of engagement events should be shared with participants to help avoid participants feeling that their involvement was just a token.