British Association for Counseling and Psychotherapy
CAMHS services generally support young people experiencing: sadness, low mood or depression. feelings of worry or anxiety. low confidence. problems with eating or your relationship with food. anger. problems sleeping. hearing voices or seeing things. thoughts about wanting to hurt yourself.
After you have been referred, you will be put on a waiting list for an initial appointment (often known as an ‘assessment’). This may sound scary, but it’s normally just a chat so the CAMHS team can get to know you a bit and see how they can help.
We are trained therapists who work with children to help them deal with their emotional and mental health problems. Our aim is to help them to understand why they feel the way you do , and what lies behind their responses to other people and to things that happen to them.
Remember you don’t have to tell your parents or carers anything about your sessions that you don’t want to, including what you talk about with your therapist. If they try and insist that you tell them, or on coming to your sessions, you can ask CAMHS to explain this to them.
We might ask you about home life, school, friends, and the kind of things you like doing, and any challenges or problems . It is often important for parents and carers to be included in this discussion, but there will also be time for you to talk alone with your CAMHS clinician, if you’d like to.
The Assessment Process The first assessment meeting is usually 60-90 minutes long which is often enough to decide what should happen next but if needed, there can be up to 3 meetings.
How long will we have to wait for a first appointment? Once the referral is received by CAMHS it will be coded as Urgent or Routine. Urgent appointments are seen within two weeks. If your referral is coded as routine, you will not wait for more than 9 weeks for a first appointment, often less.
Tier 3 . Tier 3 services are usually multidisciplniary teams or services working in a community mental health setting or a child and adolescent psychiatry outpatient service, providing a service for children and young people with more severe, complex and persistent disorders.
Reason for referral : What are the specific difficulties that you want CAMHS to address? How long has this been a problem and why is the family seeking help now? Is the problem situation-specific or more generalised? What risks are there to the young person, their family or others if this problem is not addressed.
What is CAMHS CAMHS stands for Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services. We work with children and young people up to the age of 18 who are experiencing emotional or mental health problems.
They may offer to refer you to Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services ( CAMHS ). You don’t need to do a test to find out if you have ADHD . Instead, you’ll talk to an expert such as a psychiatrist or specialist paediatrician (young person’s doctor) to find out the best way to help.
Specialist CAMHS will accept referrals of children and young people whose symptoms or distress and degree of social and/or functional impairment are severe. Usually, the duration of these difficulties should be not less than three months.
What ages do CAMHS treat? Some CAMHS work with children and young people up to the age of 18, but other services stop when a young people reaches 16, or will only work with a person aged 16-18 if they are in full-time education.
One other bugbear is that CAMHS are not able to visit families at home and see the young people in their real-life contexts.
Things that can help keep children and young people mentally well include: being in good physical health , eating a balanced diet and getting regular exercise. having time and the freedom to play, indoors and outdoors. being part of a family that gets along well most of the time.