Service Contacts Among the Children Participating in the British Child and Adolescent Mental Health Surveys

Abstract

Method: A third of the children from the 1999 British Child and Adolescent Mental Health Survey were followed up over 3 years. Parents provided summary information on service contacts for emotional, behavioural and concentration difficulties, with more detailed information being obtained by telephone interview for selected subgroups. Results: Having a psychiatric disorder predicted substantially increased contact with social services, special educational needs resources, the youth justice system and mental health services (district CAMHS and tier four, but not tier two). Of those children with psychiatric disorders, 58% had been in contact with at least one of these services for help with emotional, behavioural or concentration difficulties, including 23% who had been in contact with mental health services. Conclusions: British children attend a wide variety of services for help with emotional, behavioural and concentration difficulties. The proportion seeing specialist mental health services is higher than that generally reported in the research literature.

Service utilization by children with conduct disorders: findings from the 2004 Great Britain child mental health survey

“…The parents identified services used from a checklist consisting of the following categories: • Barriers to services use: Drawing on a list of 15 themes that had emerged from earlier research [6], parents indicated which reasons had stopped them from accessing services in the last 12 months even when concerned with their child's health [12].…”

Parental concerns about their child's emotions and behaviour and referral to specialist services: general population survey

“…Up to a third of children and adolescents attending primary care and paediatric outpatient departments have clinically significant psychopathology 2 3. Only a minority of these children reach specialist mental health services, partly because the presenting complaint is rarely psychological, so their disorders may not be recognised 2 4. Child mental health services may reject inappropriate referrals leading to frustration among referrers and families.…”

Help-Seeking for Children with Mental Health Problems: Parents’ Efforts and Experiences

“…Studies using a pathways to care approach (Goldberg and Huxley 1980) view problem recognition and/or referral from primary care physicians as fundamental in accessing specialized mental health care (e.g., Sayal 2006;Zwaanswijk et al 2005). Parents' problem recognition (Pavuluri et al 1996) and perceived burden have been found to increase the likelihood of a child receiving services, as has receiving a referral from either a primary-care physician or a teacher (Ford et al 2005;Sayal 2004). However, many children/families receive specialized mental health services without being referred, suggesting that the help-seeking process varies across families and does not follow a linear pathway (Farmer et al 2003;Ford et al 2005;Godfrey 1995;Pavuluri et al 1996;Shanley et al 2008;Zwaanswijk et al 2005).…”

“…and even fewer receive specialized mental health treatment (Hazen et al 2004) such as care at a mental health clinic or agency, or from a mental health professional such as a psychologist, psychiatrist or mental health social worker (Ford et al 2003(Ford et al , 2005Gardner et al 2004;John et al 1995;Zwaanswijk et al 2005). Understanding help-seeking, or the steps through which families move on their way to receiving treatment, may help to close the gap between those children needing and receiving mental health services (Durbin et al 2004;Zwaanswijk et al 2003).…”