Interagency collaboration has many advantages, but seems hard to realise in practice. In Belgium, the need for collaboration between the practitioners in the field of child welfare and child psychiatry, especially for children and adolescents with complex health care needs, was identified. Children with complex health care needs require coordinated care and collaboration between the different sectors in child mental health care (child welfare, child psychiatry, disability care). The authors have developed a standardised protocol based on the wraparound principles, which support interagency collaboration with family participation, named Client Network Consultation (CNC). Focus groups evaluated the CNC by eliciting practitioners' views on the structure, content and impact of collaborative interagency protocols with family involvement. Thematic analysis revealed four core themes: (1) Empowering the child and the family; (2) Utilising the strength of the collective; (3) Being considerate versus constructive a dilemma for participants in CNC; and (4) The structure of a protocol offers opportunities and challenges. Results of the study offer implications for daily practice. Several challenges for interprofessional (IP) practice in the complex field of child and adolescent mental health care are described. The value of the CNC protocol to engage families in a clinical process is also discussed.
Children with complex needs require coordinated care and collaboration between the different sectors in child mental health care. These needs and service issues are individually defined and therefore challenging for the mental health system to respond effectively. Different barriers at the organizational and policy level to initiate and maintain collaborative relationships are reported. This research explores the reality of working with a protocol for collaboration (Client Network Consultation (CNC)) by questioning the experiences of adolescents, parents, and practitioners. A qualitative design with semistructured individual interviews is used, guided by the questions from the Wraparound Fidelity Index. Useful and practical insights on effective collaboration result from the in-depth analysis of the interviews. A neutral chairperson, the presence of specialist practitioners, visualization, participation of adolescents, and parents are among the effective elements reported. Some challenges remain; the principle of equality, monitoring the action points resulting from the collaboration and effective crisis management seem very difficult to fully achieve in practice. These results present experiences from adolescents, parents, and practitioners to support an effective collaborative process for working together with children and families with complex needs.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.