Agenda item
SCRUTINY CHALLENGE SESSION: CHILDREN & YOUNG PEOPLE'S MENTAL HEALTH SERVICES (ANNUAL ACTION PLAN UPDATE)
- Meeting of Health & Adults Scrutiny Sub-Committee, Monday, 8th January, 2018 6.30 p.m. (Item 4.1)
- View the background to item 4.1
This paper submits an update on the recommendations of the Health Scrutiny Sub-Committee’s Challenge Session on Children & Young People’s Mental Health Services (CAMHS) which was undertaken in 2016.
Minutes:
The Committee heard an update from Ronke Martins-Taylor, Divisional Director Youth and Commissioning, on the Children and Young Peoples Mental Health Service action plan. Ms Martins-Taylor apologised to the Committee for the delay in publishing the action plan. It was noted that the reasons for special urgency were included in the agenda pack published prior to the winter break. Key points from each recommendation were briefly summarised, these included:
1. The Council are working with Tower Hamlets Clinical Commissioning Group and the voluntary sector to strengthen early intervention services.
2. Tower Hamlets has a record number of schools, 97%, accredited with the Healthy Schools Accreditation.
3. Parent and infant emotion health and wellbeing training was delivered in 2016/17 as part of the Tower Hamlets Together training.
4. Data is being scrutinised to investigate if there is a correlation between care leavers and teenage pregnancy.
5. A new integrated young people’s health and wellbeing service will begin in 2018 and will target young care leavers.
6. Co-commissioned specialist Community Adult Mental Health Service (CAMHS) was launched to support young people experiencing mental health issues and have been in contact with the youth justice system.
7. Empowering service users to contribute to service development.
8. Christine McInnes, Service Head Education and Partnership, has been working with families to raise awareness of mental health issues via transformation projects.
9. Improving cultural awareness of mental health issues. A pilot delivered by Tree4Life, trained local women in delivering mental health first aid.
10.Reducing stigma in mental health via a ‘Flourishing Minds’ pilot.
11.Reviewing the workforce to make it more reflective of the community. Core Bangladeshi employees were regarded as cultural consultants for the review.
12.Improving engagement with children and families in mental health awareness- The Children and Families team delivered training sessions for Parents at schools.
13.The next Children and Family System Review will consider auditing children’s centres.
14.That the Council and Tower Hamlets Clinical Commissioning Group raise awareness of mental health and available support services to non-mental health related staff.
Questions and comments from the Committee:
Councillor Mustaquim asked under what criteria are the young people admitted to the specialist CAMHS. Ms Martins-Taylor explained that the service is provided on a needs assessment basis. She advised Members to get in touch with her via email if they wanted to view a copy of the assessment criteria.
Councillor Asad said he was pleased with the Action Plan. With regard to recommendation one in the Action Plan he asked if an ethnic breakdown of the 123 people supported was available. In addition to this he asked what methods were used to support parent’s emotional wellbeing and whether the Community Commissioning Panel was representative of the community.
ACTION:
Ronke-Martin’s Taylor to investigate Councillor Asad’s questions and report back:
Recommendation 1: what was the ethnic breakdown of the 123 people supported?
Recommendation 3: What methods were used to support parents emotional wellbeing in the training delivered?
Recommendation 9: Is the Community Commissioning Panel representative of the Community?
The Chair asked if there was a strand being developed around digital mental health outreach. Bill Williams, CAMHS, said there was interest in looking at this as a commissioning priority but there is nothing in place at the moment. Further to sharing best practice with local providers CAMHS is aware of initiatives such as virtual counsellors at school and the Anna Freud Centre app to track mental health.
Cllr Asad asked if these recommendations were a result of the recent Ofsted result. It was confirmed that the tabled Action Plan was drafted in line with best practice in the sector as opposed to a specific response to Ofsted.
There was a discussion on the difficulty of getting priority for housing based on mental health considerations. The Committee agreed the link between housing and mental health should be explored.
The Chair thanked Ms Martins-Taylor for the update report.
RESOLVED
To note the Action Plan
Supporting documents:
- Scrutiny Challenge Session: Children, item 4.1 PDF 92 KB
- Children's Mental Health Scrutiny Challenge Session Action Plan UPDATE 2..., item 4.1 PDF 304 KB