Improving access to and engagement with mental health services among young people from refugee backgrounds: service user and provider perspectives

Colucci, Erminia; Valibhoy, Madeleine; Szwarc, Josef; Kaplan, Ida; Minas, Harry

doi:10.1080/17542863.2017.1279674

Cited by 12 publications

(53 citation statements)

References 27 publications

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“…This lack of well-functioning collaboration and accessibility to CAMHS left the lay counsellors with a sense of loneliness and vulnerability. This structural problem is in-line with a previous study emphasising "building relationships between agencies" and increasing accessibility to mental health services for refugee children are crucial for increased service utility [51] and needs to be addressed at a health governance level. There needs to be more time dedicated to identifying ways in which collaboration could be enhanced.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 77%

Readiness of Allied Professionals to Join the Mental Health Workforce: A Qualitative Evaluation of Trained Lay Trauma Counsellors’ Experiences When Refugee Youth Disclose Suicidal Ideation

Gupta

Wijk

Warner

et al. 2021

IJERPH

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The recent refugee crisis presented a huge challenge for the Swedish mental health workforce. Hence, innovative mental health workforce solutions were needed. Unaccompanied refugee minors (URM) are a particularly vulnerable refugee group. Teaching Recovery Techniques (TRT) was introduced as a community-based intervention utilising trained lay counsellors in a stepped model of care for refugee youth experiencing trauma symptoms. Professionals (e.g., teachers, social workers) can deliver the Cognitive Behavioural Therapy-based intervention after a brief training. A point of debate in this workforce solution is the readiness of trained lay counsellors to deal with potentially demanding situations like disclosure of suicidal ideation. This study aimed to explore the TRT trained lay counsellors’ experiences of procedures upon URM’s disclosure of suicidal ideation. Individual semi-structured interviews with TRT trained lay counsellors were conducted, then analysed using systemic text condensation. The analysis revealed four themes: “Importance of safety structures”, “Collaboration is key”, “Let sleeping dogs lie” and “Going the extra mile”. Dealing with suicidal ideation is challenging and feelings of helplessness occur. Adding adequate supervision and specific training on suicidal ideation using role play is recommended. Collaboration between agencies and key stakeholders is essential when targeting refugee mental health in a stepped care model.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 77%

Readiness of Allied Professionals to Join the Mental Health Workforce: A Qualitative Evaluation of Trained Lay Trauma Counsellors’ Experiences When Refugee Youth Disclose Suicidal Ideation

Gupta

Wijk

Warner

et al. 2021

IJERPH

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“…Three of the studies focused on refugee children under 18 years (Betancourt et al, 2012; Cameron et al, 2016; Dura-Vila et al, 2012), two studies focused on children and young people aged 12 to 25 (Posselt, Procter, de Crespigny, & Galletly, 2015; Posselt, Procter, Galletly, & de Crespigny, 2015), three studies focused on young people aged 18 to 25 (Choi, 2010; Colucci et al, 2017; Valibhoy et al, 2017), and one study did not clearly state the age of the refugee children, but referred to “children” throughout and was therefore included (Nilsson et al, 2012). Across the studies refugee children or young people came from varying countries or continents: Central and South America (Betancourt et al, 2012), Africa (Betancourt et al, 2012; Cameron et al, 2016; Dura-Vila et al, 2012; Nilsson et al, 2012; Posselt, Procter, de Crespigny, & Galletly, 2015; Posselt, Procter, Galletly, & de Crespigny, 2015; Valibhoy et al, 2017), Europe (Betancourt et al, 2012; Dura-Vila et al, 2012), Asia (Betancourt et al, 2012; Cameron et al, 2016; Posselt, Procter, de Crespigny, & Galletly, 2015; Posselt, Procter, Galletly, & de Crespigny, 2015), including North Korea (Choi, 2010) and the Middle East (Betancourt et al, 2012; Cameron et al, 2016; Dura-Vila et al, 2012; Posselt, Procter, de Crespigny, & Galletly, 2015; Posselt, Procter, Galletly, & de Crespigny, 2015), and two studies did not identify the background of participants (Colucci et al, 2017; Dura-Vila et al, 2012). Studies were conducted in four resettlement countries: Australia (Cameron et al, 2016; Colucci et al, 2017; Posselt, Procter, de Crespigny, & Galletly, 2015; Posselt, Procter, Galletly, & de Crespigny, 2015; Valibhoy et al, 2017), England (Dura-Vila et al, 2012), the United States (Betancourt et al, 2012; Nilsson et al, 2012), and South Korea (Choi, 2010).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Practitioner competencies for working with refugee children and young people: A scoping review

Due

Currie

2021

Transcult Psychiatry

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Research indicates that refugee and asylum seeker children and young people often require specialised psychological support. Competencies have been established as helpful in guiding the training, education and ongoing professional development of practitioners working in specialised areas. To date there has been no comprehensive review of the literature concerning practitioner competencies for working with refugee or asylum seeker children and young people. This scoping review therefore aimed to synthesise all literature regarding practitioner competencies that are considered important for working in the area of mental health with refugee and asylum seeker children and young people. Literature was sourced from PsycINFO, Scopus, and PubMed. Studies were included if they: a) were published in peer-reviewed journals, b) were published in English, c) were published in the last 25 years, d) collected primary data, e) related to children and/or young people (defined as aged under 25) with refugee or asylum seeker backgrounds, and f) discussed practitioner competencies (in relation to refugee or asylum seeker children or young people). Nine articles met criteria and a deductive thematic analysis identified six key competencies: 1) knowledge of the complexity of needs of refugees; 2) use of holistic approaches; 3) ability to work in co-ordination with others in the child's network; 4) ability to build therapeutic relationships; 5) seeking feedback; and 6) cultural competency. Further empirical research that directly aims to identify practitioner competencies, from both the practitioner and client perspective, will support the challenging work done by practitioners working with refugee and asylum seeker children and young people.

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“…According to the respondents, the inadequacy of resources weakens the quality of services. Making relatively small investments in early intervention, such as providing information to parents about available services and benefits to which their children are entitled, providing better coordination across the service systems, and providing a mechanism for children with MH needs and their families to be heard, could prevent complex and expensive problems, which could result in savings (Hoffman et al, 2016;Bringewatt and Gershof, 2010;Colucci et al, 2017).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, previous international studies have found several MH service-level barriers, including lack of available, high-quality, and developmentally appropriate MH services (Hoffman et al, 2016), lack of resources and providers of MH services (Reid and Brown, 2008;O'Brien et al, 2016), long waiting times (Pryjmachuk et al, 2012), inoperative system integration (Reid and Brown, 2008), and lack of information about available services, inflexible services, and complex administrative procedures (Anderson et al, 2017). These barriers, in turn, increase waiting times, reduce access to specialist services (O'Brien et al, 2016), increase costs, weaken users' expectations of providers' attitudes (Horwitz et al, 2012), and can negatively affect early intervention for children (Reid and Brown, 2008;Pryjmachuk et al, 2012), the importance of which international studies have recognized and emphasized (O'Brien et al, 2016;Bringewatt and Gershof, 2010;Colucci et al, 2017). Thus, the international studies presented above raise the question of how children's MH services function in Finland.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Finnish professionals’ views of the current mental health services and multiprofessional collaboration in children’s mental health promotion

Savolainen

Sormunen

Bykachev

et al. 2020

International Journal of Mental Health

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Promotion of children's mental health (MH) plays an important role in preventing further MH problems. In Finland, the wellbeing of children is supported in early childhood education and care (ECEC), basic education, maternity clinics, and child health clinics. Providing these services for children and families requires multiprofessional collaboration. The aim of this study was to investigate the current practice of children's MH promotion, more specifically children's MH services and multiprofessional collaboration between social and health care services and ECEC/ basic education. The study focused on MH questions regarding children in 18 municipalities of Finland from the approach of socio-ecological model of health promotion. The participants of this cross-sectional study were ECEC professionals in municipal day care, basic education professionals, and primary health care professionals who work with children younger than 14. The data collected via questionnaires were analyzed using descriptive statistics, chi-squared analysis, principal component analysis (PCA), the Brown-Forsythe robust test, and Tukey HSD post hoc comparisons. A total of 482 professionals participated in this study. Overall, respondents indicated relatively poor satisfaction toward most aspects of current MH promotion. Professionals from municipalities that provided primary health care and social services independently evaluated MH promotion most positively. However, deficiencies in multiprofessional collaboration between organizations were reported. The work experience influenced professionals' perceptions of the challenges of collaboration; respondents with the least work experience were most critically concerned. These results imply that the promotion of children's MH and MH services needs to be further developed.

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Improving access to and engagement with mental health services among young people from refugee backgrounds: service user and provider perspectives

Cited by 12 publications

References 27 publications

Readiness of Allied Professionals to Join the Mental Health Workforce: A Qualitative Evaluation of Trained Lay Trauma Counsellors’ Experiences When Refugee Youth Disclose Suicidal Ideation

Readiness of Allied Professionals to Join the Mental Health Workforce: A Qualitative Evaluation of Trained Lay Trauma Counsellors’ Experiences When Refugee Youth Disclose Suicidal Ideation

Practitioner competencies for working with refugee children and young people: A scoping review

Finnish professionals’ views of the current mental health services and multiprofessional collaboration in children’s mental health promotion

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