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Think child, think parent, think family: a briefing for senior managers
- Author:
- SOCIAL CARE INSTITUTE FOR EXCELLENCE
- Publisher:
- Social Care Institute for Excellence
- Publication year:
- 2010
- Pagination:
- 4p.
- Place of publication:
- London
This ‘At a glance’ summary is aimed at senior managers and presents key recommendations from the SCIE guide 'Think child, think parent, think family: a guide to parental mental health and child welfare'. The summary outlines the context, including lack of coordination of services, challenges for staff, financial restrictions and the growing change in policy direction towards supporting families and improving child health and wellbeing. It then makes key recommendations to improve services including taking a strategic multi-agency approach, leading cultural change, involving people who use services, embedding the whole-family approaches into quality systems, improving staff skills and knowledge and ensuring that information is gathered and made accessible. Experience at a number of pilot sites in local authorities in England and Northern Ireland highlights the importance of senior management involvement to the success of this approach.
Breakthrough Northern Ireland
- Authors:
- POOLE Gavin, et al
- Publisher:
- Centre for Social Justice
- Publication year:
- 2010
- Pagination:
- 48p.
- Place of publication:
- London
The Centre for Social Justice prepared this report following consultation with voluntary and community organisations about poverty and social problems in Northern Ireland. The report discusses economic dependency and worklessness (including barriers to labour market engagement and the unemployment system), fragility (including conflict, mental health and addiction), and the next generation (including family breakdown, family dysfunction and children in care). Each chapter includes policy recommendations for alleviating poverty and reversing social breakdown in the context of the economic, social and political climate of Northern Ireland.
Promoting mental health in Northern Ireland: addressing division, inequality and stigma
- Authors:
- DAVIDSON Gavin, LEAVEY Gerard
- Journal article citation:
- Journal of Public Mental Health, 9(4), December 2010, pp.6-15.
- Publisher:
- Emerald
The authors review the literature on the impact of sectarian violence, known as ‘the Troubles’, on mental health in Northern Ireland. Three main phases of professional and policy response were identified, starting with concerns about the effects of violence in the 1970s, then several years of collective denial and neglect, until acknowledgement, following the Good Friday Agreement in 1998, of high levels of trauma and unmet need. The authors also explore the impact of inequality and stigma and argue that peace is necessary but insufficient for promoting mental health. The development of mental health services in Northern Ireland are then outlined and the main developments in promoting mental health are discussed. It is suggested that attempts to address the needs arising as a result of ‘the Troubles’ and more general mental health promotion strategies have, to some extent, developed in parallel and that it may be important to integrate these efforts. Routine screening, in primary care and mental health services for trauma, including Troubles-related trauma, is recommended to identify and address these issues on an individual level. However, the authors also argue that more substantial political change is needed to effectively address societal division, inequality and stigma to the benefit of all.
Screening for mental health problems in adults with learning disabilities using the Mini PAS-ADD Interview
- Authors:
- DEVINE Maurice, TAGGART Laurence, MCLORNIAN Paula
- Journal article citation:
- British Journal of Learning Disabilities, 38(4), December 2010, pp.252-258.
- Publisher:
- Wiley
Prevalence rates vary considerably regarding the mental health of people with learning disabilities. This variation is a consequence of the assessment methods used to identify such clinical conditions and also the different populations studied. The aim of this study was to establish the prevalence of mental health problems in 96 adults with mild-to-moderate learning disabilities receiving community-based services in Northern Ireland. Using the Mini PAS-ADD Interview schedule, a number of specifically trained interviewers interviewed staff who supported these adults with learning disabilities in their particular work or day care setting to determine whether or not participants had a potential mental health problem. This study found a 33.3% prevalence rate of mental health problems in this community sample. The results of this study fall between previous community prevalence studies that range from 14% to 50%. This sample was found to score higher on the sub-scales of depression and psychosis compared with other prevalence studies. In order to examine the agreement of these findings, a random sample of 27 of the participants were also interviewed by a psychiatrist specialising in learning disability regarding their mental health status. The results found that the Mini PAS-ADD Interview has an overall sensitivity of 1 (100%) and a specificity of 77%. The practical issues of the screening process are discussed. Methodological limitations are also highlighted in accurately predicting prevalence rates of mental health problems in the learning disability population by clinical staff.
Assessing the mental health needs of young people living in state care using the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire
- Authors:
- MCCRYSTAL Patrick, MCALONEY Kareena
- Journal article citation:
- Child Care in Practice, 16(3), July 2010, pp.215-226.
- Publisher:
- Taylor and Francis
Young people living in the state care system are often reported to experience poorer levels of mental health and wellbeing. Government policy encourages a holistic approach to the assessment of all aspects of health and wellbeing of these young people. The aim of this study was to use data from the Youth Development Study, a longitudinal study being undertaken at Queens University Belfast, to show the value of the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) as a screening tool for mental health issues with young people entering state care. The data were obtained during the first year of the study, with young people aged 11 and 12 years, and fourth year, with young people aged 14 and 15 years. The data obtained using the SDQ was compared for young people who indicated they were living in state care with those living with at least one biological parent outside care. The findings showed that a higher proportion of young people living in state care reported scores on the SDQ that indicated a higher propensity to problem behaviour at both stages of the survey. The results show that the SDQ is a tool that may assist professionals to make an informed decision on the health and wellbeing of young people entering the care system and possibly can lead to an empirically assisted decision on intervention planning.
Adult community statistics: 1st April 2009-31st March 2010
- Author:
- NORTHERN IRELAND. Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety
- Publisher:
- Northern Ireland. Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety
- Publication year:
- 2010
- Pagination:
- 77p., tables
- Place of publication:
- Belfast
This statistical report presents information on activity for all Programmes of Care for adults, gathered from HSC Trusts via the annual and quarterly statistical returns. Statistical tables are presented in 6 sections. All Programmes of Care, Elderly Care, Mental Health, Learning Disability, Physical and Sensory Disability, and Primary Health and Adult Community.
Challenges in evaluating a ‘think child, think parent, think family’ approach to adult mental health and children’s services
- Author:
- ROSCOE Hannah
- Journal article citation:
- Research Policy and Planning, 28(2), 2010, pp.103-114.
- Publisher:
- Social Services Research Group
In 2009, the Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE) published a guide on parental mental health and child welfare, which makes recommendations about how services can better support families in which there is a parent with a mental health problem. This guide is based on a ‘think family’ approach, which requires effective interagency working between adult mental health and children’s services. This article discusses how the recommendations of the guide might be implemented. In September 2009, a project team at SCIE began working with 5 sites in England and 5 Health and Social Care Trusts in Northern Ireland to implement the guide and gather further learning about good practice and solutions to some of the barriers identified. The article considers the challenges of designing methods of evaluation in these sites, particularly in terms of how to define and measure the impact of implementation. It suggests that the concept of a ‘complex intervention’ is helpful in thinking about implementation of the guide in terms of allowing local flexibility, targeting multiple parts of the health and social care system and the range of possible outcomes of the work. In line with the principles of realist evaluation, a key role of the evaluation is to help further understand and map the intervention rather than simply to provide a summation of success or failure.
Referrals to a learning disability social work team 1996 to 2005
- Authors:
- MORRISON Aine, BICKERSTAFF David, TAYLOR Brian J.
- Journal article citation:
- British Journal of Learning Disabilities, 38(3), September 2010, pp.168-174.
- Publisher:
- Wiley
In order to understand better the needs of clients and to inform the delivery of services, referrals to the North Belfast Learning Disability Social Work Team between 1 January 1996 and 31 December 2005 were studied. The documentary analysis of all 252 referrals during the 10-year period included referral books, social work files and the electronic client-based system Soscare. There were increases in referrals with recorded autism and in those aged 18-25, and high levels of recorded behavioural difficulties. There were low levels of recorded visual impairment, hearing impairment and mental health problems. Twenty-one per cent of referrals were likely to have been diagnosed with a learning disability at age 16 or over. Child referrals showed a broad spectrum of identified need whereas adult referrals were predominantly identified as needing daytime occupation. There was an increase in the team caseload from 364 to 489 over the period caused by the number of referrals exceeding the number of closures every year except 1997. The article recommends a greater focus on health status in social work assessments, a review of case management practice and greater inclusion of `newly diagnosed' adolescents and adults in service planning.
Guidance on responding to people with mental ill health or learning disabilities
- Author:
- NATIONAL POLICING IMPROVEMENT AGENCY
- Publisher:
- National Policing Improvement Agency
- Publication year:
- 2010
- Pagination:
- 208p., bibliog.
- Place of publication:
- London
This guidance provides advice to help police respond more effectively to people who are experiencing mental ill health or who have a learning disability. The guidance is a comprehensive document, providing advice on needs that arise in either a criminal justice capacity (where the person is a victim, witness, suspect or offender) or in a health care capacity (where the police may be acting in support of others who are dealing with someone experiencing a mental health crisis). The separate sections of the guidance cover: general operational guidance; mental health principles; operational police responses to victims and witnesses; use of police powers under the Mental Health Act 1983 and Mental Capacity Act 2005; operational police responses to suspects and offenders; and managing police responses. An aim of the guidance is to support more people with mental ill health being accommodated in health facilities rather than in police custody through better implementation of the Mental Health Act 1983. It also aims to provide an improved response to victims, witnesses, suspects and offenders leading to a reduction in repeat victimisation and offending, and increased reporting to the police of crimes against people with mental ill health or learning disabilities (including discrimination, victimisation and harassment).
Young children returning home from care: the birth parents' perspective
- Authors:
- MALET Montserrat Fargas, et al
- Journal article citation:
- Child and Family Social Work, 15(1), February 2010, pp.77-86.
- Publisher:
- Wiley
UK studies suggest that although the majority of children who enter care return home, a significant number of these children eventually re-enter the care system. While a wide range of literature exists on the experiences of children in foster care or adoption, much less is known about children after they return home to their birth parents. This paper, focusing on the perspectives of a small sample of birth parents of young children who returned home from care, draws on findings from the Northern Ireland Care Pathways and Outcomes Study that has been following a population of 374 children who were under 5 years and in care in Northern Ireland on the 31st of March 2000. As part of this study, interviews were conducted with the foster parents of 55 children, the adoptive parents of 51 children and the birth parents of 9 children who had returned home from care. The paper investigates the birth parents views on how they coped while their child was in care, how they coped after the child had returned home and how their child fared at home. Results revealed that these parents, and their children, were experiencing multiple difficulties and struggled to cope after the children had returned home – raising concerns about the health and welfare of these children.