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Charity wants to get children’s mental health #OutInTheOpen

National charity YoungMinds is encouraging people to bring children’s mental health out into the open with a new step challenge for Spring.

YoungMinds #OutInTheOpen challenge aims to get people talking about mental health for children and young peopleThe charity’s #OutInTheOpen campaign challenges people to walk 310,000 steps in 31 days during May to raise money for children and young people’s mental health, and encourage open and honest conversations about mental health.

On their website, YoungMinds explains that it “takes courage to ask for help. But for many young people who do, the support they need just isn’t there.”

They are promoting the #OutInTheOpen challenge to raise vital funds to ensure that all children and young people get the mental health support they need, when they need it.

Mental health steps challenge accessible for all

Children and young people may be helped by the #OutInTheOpen steps challengeParticipants can sign up through Facebook or JustGiving and will receive a free YoungMinds t-shirt to wear as they complete the steps challenge. The charity is inviting people to join their Facebook community and meet other fundraisers as they complete their 310,000 steps and bring conversations about children’s mental health out into the open.

There is no registration deadline to take part in the #OutInTheOpen challenge, but it officially starts on 1st May 2023.

It is free to anyone who wants to sign up, but participants are encouraged to try and fundraise or to personally donate to YoungMinds.

YoungMinds advises that the 310,000 steps should be completed however is best for each individual’s physical ability, and that the step count can be spread across all 31 days in May, or completed over just two weeks, depending on your preferences and fitness levels. The charity encourages everyone to adapt the challenge to suit their own needs and goals, and welcomes people completing similar distances in wheelchairs or using mobility scooters, for example.

Participants in the #OutInTheOpen challenge can download a free step tracker and sponsor form from the YoungMinds website.

Supporting children and young people’s mental health

Five children in every classroom have mental health problemsYoungMinds is the UK’s leading charity supporting children and young people’s mental health. Their aim is to prevent children’s mental health reaching crisis point, and to ensure that they have services available to them when they speak out for help.

It is estimated that five children in every classroom in the UK has a mental health problem. YoungMinds says that a quarter of 17-year-old girls has self-harmed in the last year and that suicide remains the single biggest killer of boys and men.

Their mission is to ensure that no young person feels alone with their mental health, and they provide tools and advice to help children and young people support their mental health and wellbeing.

Stress awareness for children and young people

To mark Stress Awareness Month this April, they have provided tips, information and advice to help children and young people manage stress.

This includes the emotional and physical signs and symptoms of stress, such as:

  • Feeling irritable or impatient, overwhelmed, anxious, worried or depressed
  • Having trouble sleeping or feeling tired
  • Experiencing muscles aches, headaches or tension
  • Having difficulty breathing
  • Changes in weight
  • Changes to your menstrual cycle

YoungMinds also provides tips about helping to feel calm, a guide to self-care and advice about how to manage a stressful workload, whether its exam stress, university worries or coping with paid work.

The charity also provides more tips and advice on its social medial channels and you can also subscribe to their website for news and updates, including real-life stories.

Training to support children’s mental health

The charity challenge will help children and young people with mental health problemsFirst Response Training (FRT) is a leading national training provider delivering courses in subjects such as health and safety, first aid, fire safety, manual handling, food safety, mental health, health and social care, safeguarding and more.

They work with a large number of early years and childcare providers, as well as schools, colleges, and children’s services.

Their courses include Understanding Mental Health, Youth Mental Health First Aid, Anxiety Awareness, Self-Harm Awareness and Suicide Awareness.

A trainer from FRT says:

“Many children across the UK are really struggling with their mental health, and they need advice, support and treatment as soon as possible. YoungMinds does great work and it’s really great to see a campaign like this, that everyone get involved in and which puts the spotlight on the mental health and wellbeing of children and young people.

“It’s vitally important that we keep talking openly about mental health and that we take the time to have conversations with children to support their wellbeing and check in with them.

“It’s also really important for anyone who works closely with children and young people to have a good understanding of mental health and be able to spot the signs that someone may be struggling. They should also feel confident to offer appropriate early help and support. Focused training can help with this.”

For more information on the training that FRT can provide, please call them today on freephone 0800 310 2300 or send an e-mail to info@firstresponsetraining.com.

Child mental health referrals up 39% after ‘difficult’ year

Referrals for child mental health services have risen by 39% in England in just one year, official data has revealed.

Child mental health is declining in EnglandNHS referrals for mental health treatment for under-18s increased to more than 1.1 million during 2021-22, compared to 839,570 in 2020-21, and 850,741 in 2019-20.

The figures – branded “alarming” by the NSPCC – represent children who are suicidal, self-harming or suffering serious depression or anxiety, as well as those living with eating disorders.

Social issues impacting child mental health

Child mental health has been negatively impacted by the pandemicExperts say key social issues, including the Covid-19 pandemic, social inequality, austerity and online harm are all fuelling soaring rates of mental ill-health among children and young people.

They also said that children continue to face increased academic pressures to catch up following the Covid-19 lockdowns, while worrying about their future prospects amid a cost-of-living crisis and issues like climate change.

Mental health services unable to respond quickly enough

Dr Elaine Lockhart, Chair of the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Faculty at the Royal College of Psychiatrists, warned that overstretched services mean that children are sliding through the cracks.

She explained that “specialist services are needing to respond to the most urgent and the most unwell,” such as children suffering from psychosis, suicidal thoughts and severe anxiety disorder. Meanwhile, targets for seeing children with eating disorders were sliding “completely.”

Data from NHS Digital shows that hospital admissions for children with eating disorders have risen by 82% in two years.

Lockhart added:

“I think what’s frustrating for us is if we could see them more quickly and intervene, then the difficulties might not become as severe as they do, because they’ve had to wait.”

A difficult year for mental health

Child mental health has been impacted by social issues such as austerityLockhart explains that child mental health had been declining before the pandemic struck, with increasing social inequality, austerity and online harm all playing a role.

Then Covid-19 hit and lockdowns were introduced, resulting in “such a negative effect on a lot of children. Those who had been doing well became vulnerable and those who were vulnerable became unwell.”

Tom Madders from the youth mental health charity YoungMinds described the new figures as “deeply concerning.”

He said:

“The last year has been one of the most difficult for this age group, emerging from the pandemic to limited prospects for their futures, coupled with an increase in academic pressure to catch up on lost learning, and the impact of the cost-of-living crisis.

“The current state of play cannot continue. The government must get a grip of the situation.”

More funding for mental health services

Meanwhile, a spokesperson from the Department of Health and Social Care said they were investing £2.3 billion a year into mental health services so that an additional 345,000 children and young people will be able to access mental health support by 2024.

They added that they were “aiming to grow the mental health workforce by 27,000 more staff by this time too.”

Child mental health training and support

Child mental health training is importantFirst Response Training (FRT) is a leading national training provider delivering courses in subjects such as health and safety, first aid, fire safety, manual handling, food safety, mental health, health and social care, safeguarding and more.

They work with a large number of early years and childcare providers, as well as schools, colleges, and children’s services.

Their courses include Understanding Mental Health, Youth Mental Health First Aid, Anxiety Awareness, Self-Harm Awareness and Suicide Awareness.

A trainer from FRT says:

“Children have faced isolation, loneliness, academic upheaval, bereavement, money worries and other difficulties since the pandemic, and, on top of this, when they do come forward with concerns about their mental health they may have to wait a long time for the specialist support they need.

“It’s therefore vitally important that anyone who works closely with children and young people has an understanding of mental health, is able to spot the signs that someone may be struggling and can offer appropriate early help and support. Focused training can help with this.”

For more information on the training that FRT can provide, please call them today on freephone 0800 310 2300 or send an e-mail to info@firstresponsetraining.com.

Parents have lost faith in child mental health care

An investigation carried out by the BBC has found that parents and headteachers have lost faith in the mental health care system for children and young people as they face “agonisingly” long waits for treatment.

After examining data from half of England’s services, investigators found that 1 in 5 children seen for mental health problems during the past year waited over 12 weeks.

Doctors have even reported that “distressed and agitated” children who have been struggling during the pandemic are ending up in emergency departments and are being admitted on to general wards, even though they lack specialist mental health support.

Dr Catherine Hayhurst, from the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, told the BBC that it had become “difficult to manage on the wards.”

NHS England said there was “no doubt that the pandemic has turned children and young people’s lives upside down,” and that it was in the process of significantly expanding access to mental health services in order to help them.

Children face long waits for mental health support

Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) saw 420,000 children and young people during 2020-21. However, an estimated 1.5 million under-18s are thought to have a mental health disorder.

The waits faced by children accessing these specialist services are not routinely published but data obtained by the BBC from 46 services through a Freedom of Information Request (FOIR) showed that half of those seen waited longer than four weeks. A fifth of referred children waited more than 12 weeks, and the average wait for services was more than two months. Shockingly, in some areas, waiting times even topped 8 months.

A third of the Trusts provided data on children and young people who were still waiting for specialist mental health support. The numbers have doubled since the first lockdown ended in June 2020.

The overall figures do suggest that there has been an improvement in waiting times since before the pandemic took hold, but this could be due to a reduction in people coming forward for help during the first national lockdown in 2020.

The BBC also reports that some of the services closed their waiting lists altogether during lockdown, meaning that the full extent of the waits could be undercounted.

Children’s mental health services ‘overwhelmed’

Now one headteacher says the long waits have caused her to lose faith with child mental health services.

Michelle Catterson runs Moon Hall School in Surrey, which teaches children aged 7 to 16 who have dyslexia. She says the pandemic has been “really difficult” for children and that the support they so desperately need is often missing.

She explained: “Services are completely overwhelmed as things stand currently.

“When I have parents that are in a really desperate situation, I’m often reluctant to refer them because I know the length of time that they’ll have to wait, and sometimes there just isn’t that opportunity to wait.

“You need that support right there, right then, to try and help the child and the family.”

Meanwhile, Emma Thomas, the Chief Executive of national youth mental health charity YoungMinds, said: “We have seen a big rise in referrals to mental health services and, as this data shows, it’s clear they have been struggling to cope. The pandemic has had a huge impact on young people’s mental health, exacerbating existing pressures and creating new ones.

“The young people we work with have told us that they have struggled with isolation, loneliness and concerns about the future, while those that experienced trauma during the lockdowns, or were already experiencing inequalities, are likely to be disproportionately affected.”

NHS England says that, by 2023, services will be able to support an additional 345,000 children and young people struggling with their mental health.

Plans also include the rollout of school mental health teams in order to provide earlier support to children than CAMHS services.

Children at risk while waiting for mental health care

The report by the BBC comes after Youth Mental Health Day, established by charity Stem4, which focussed this year on helping young people #StrideForward with their mental health and wellbeing in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The Stem4 Teachers Survey 2020 suggested that more than half (54%) of teachers felt their students’ mental health had suffered negatively as a result of the pandemic.

Despite this, less than a third of 5–19-year-olds with a mental health condition were receiving access to care and treatment on the NHS, and 73% of teachers said the pandemic had impacted their school or college’s ability to deliver on its own mental health strategy for pupils.

More than half of the teachers questioned (57%) said they feared students with mental health problems would come to harm while waiting for treatment.

Youth mental health training and support

First Response Training (FRT) is a leading national training provider delivering courses in subjects such as health and safety, first aid, fire safety, manual handling, food hygiene, mental health, health and social care, safeguarding and more.

They work with a large number of early years and childcare providers, as well as schools, colleges, and children’s services.

Their courses include Understanding Mental Health, Youth Mental Health First Aid and Self-Harm Awareness.

A trainer from FRT says:

“Children have faced isolation, loneliness, academic upheaval, bereavement and other difficulties over the past year, and, on top of this, when they do come forward with concerns about their mental health they may have to wait a long time for the specialist support they need.

“It’s therefore vitally important that anyone who works closely with children and young people has an understanding of mental health, is able to spot the signs that someone may be struggling and can offer appropriate early help and support. Focused training can help with this.”

For more information on the training that FRT can provide, please call them today on freephone 0800 310 2300 or send an e-mail to info@firstresponsetraining.com.