Dr Maria Long, Professor Rose McCabe, Brad Begley

Improving communication between young people and parents/carers by ‘doing more with less’: using solution-focused practice in stretched Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) settings  

Dr Maria Long is a mental health Research Fellow who manages the Supporting Adolescents with Self Harm (SASH) study. Her current work focuses on improving outcomes for young people using brief solution focused interventions for young people and their parents/carers in CAMHS settings.

Maria.long@citystgeorges.ac.uk    

Professor Rose McCabe is a psychologist specialising in professional-patient communication in mental health care. She has expertise in developing and implementing solution focused interventions to improve wellbeing for young people.

rose.mccabe@citystgeorges.ac.uk   

Brad Begley is a social worker, therapist and MRes student at City St George’s, University of London. He has expertise in working with children and young people in CAMHS settings and he is currently developing a PhD to adapt solution focused practice for the treatment of mental health difficulties in asylum-seeking children.

brad.begley@nhs.net

We will discuss the research we are conducting in which we have trained CAMHS practitioners in solution-focused practice to support young people and parents/carers presenting to A&E with self-harm and/or suicidal ideation. This work is being conducted across six teams in three NHS Trusts.   In the presentation, discussion and with interactive activities we will cover:  

• Discussion of our randomised controlled trial (SASH study) of a brief solution-focused intervention for young people (and their parents/carers) who present to the Emergency Department with self-harm or suicidal thoughts to reduce self-harm and improve wellbeing.   
• Our experiences and learning from training CAMHS and CAMHS crisis staff in solution-focused practice.  
• Clips of solution-focused conversations between young people and parents/carers and individual parent/carer sessions as part of the SASH study.  
• Case study of using solution-focused practice with an asylum-seeking child. 

Participants will learn about the delivery and implementation of solution-focused practice in NHS CAMHS and CAMHS crisis settings and the training of staff.   Discussion and interactive activities will encompass training professionals in solution-focused practice, working with young people in crisis and their parents/carers, and the delivery of solution-focused practice with an interpreter with an asylum-seeking child.

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