Children with mental disorder wait a year for care

ALMOST 30% of children and adolescents with a mental health disorder must wait more than a year for specialist help, a new report reveals.

It also shows that more than 20% were waiting up to a year, while 16% were waiting up to 26 weeks. Just over a third were waiting less than 13 weeks.

The Health Service Executive’s first annual report on Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) warns the incidence of mental health problems is increasing among young people.

It points out that previous studies have shown that one in 10 children and adolescents suffer from mental health disorders severe enough to cause impairment.

HSE chief executive, Prof Brendan Drumm, who launched the report, said the problem of waiting lists was not just in child and adolescent mental health services.

He believed the public must demand accountability for what they invest in the health service instead of accepting that it was a resource issue.

According to the report there were 3,117 children and adolescents waiting to be seen by community CAMHS teams in November 2008.

HSE clinical director for child and adult psychiatry, Dr Brendan Doody, said urgent cases were prioritised while those considered to be “routine” were placed on a waiting list.

Those who self-harmed, were at risk of suicide, and other risk categories were classified as emergencies.

“Even if someone is put on a waiting list and there is any change contact can be made with the team,” he said.

Dr Doody said specialist mental health services did not have the capacity to respond to every child with a mental health problem. There was a need to build capacity, not only in specialist services but in primary care, school counselling and community psychology services.

He also pointed out that 18 of the 49 CAMHS teams had a waiting list of less than 25 cases and 40 had less than a hundred.

“You are looking at a small number of services having large waiting lists,” said Dr Doody, who said many of the teams were considering how they could reduce waiting times.

He believed three months was an acceptable waiting time for non-urgent cases.

Over the past three years, 54 CAMHS teams have been established, 49 of which are community based.

According to the report, 15-year-olds are the largest age category attending community CAMHS services, followed by children in the 10 to 14 age group.

Emotional problems and hyperkinetic disorders, including attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), accounted for more than half of mental problems experienced by children and adolescents.

Males were in the majority for all types of problems reported except deliberate self harm, where they made up 31.7% of cases, and eating disorders, where they made up 19.5% of cases.

While males made up over 70% of cases in the younger children’s groups, this had dropped back to 45% male to 55% female ratio by mid to late teens.

The report also shows that 263 of the 406 children and adolescents needing in-patient care were admitted to adult psychiatric units. Females accounted for alsmost 605 of admissions.