MEDICAL and child care authorities in Worcestershire are pooling their ideas and expertise to make sure they work together as effectively as possible when supporting children and young people with mental health problems.

Worcestershire County Council's Children's Social Care, Worcestershire Acute Hospitals Trust and Worcestershire Health and Care Trust have developed a joint Children's Urgent Mental Health Care Protocol.

This is a tool that aims to guide professionals in ways of working together to most effectively meet the needs of children and young people who attend local health services in emotional or mental health crisis.

The protocol includes quick reference diagrams to help the professionals know what to do and who to contact to get the right support in place.

One of the important messages within this is to avoid using A & E unless a child needs emergency medical care due to something like an overdose or serious physical injury.

Instead, urgent mental health care can be provided by GPs (or out of hours GP services – dial 111) working with mental health and social care partners.

Councillor John Campion, Worcestershire County Council's cabinet member for children and families said: "This tool will be of great help to ensure all partners are working to the same guidelines to help vulnerable children and young people get the most appropriate support for their mental health need.

“Mental health is an increasing problem in children and young people so we need to ensure all professionals across Worcestershire are working together to provide them with the best support available."

Philippa Coleman, children’s clinical services manager at Worcestershire Health and Care Trust said: “We provide mental health support for children and young people right across Worcestershire but recognise that often it requires a multi-agency and organisational approach to ensure issues are detected early and treated appropriately.

“This protocol will ensure consistency across the health and care system in Worcestershire which will ultimately improve the way we respond to children, young people and their families/carers when they are experiencing mental ill health.”

Dr Andrew Short, consultant paediatrician and divisional director of medicine for women and children at Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust, said: “We are pleased to see this guidance which ensure that vulnerable children and young people receive the right care, delivered by the correctly trained professional, in the most appropriate setting.

“This is a great example of partner organisations working effectively together to make improvements that will both benefit service users, as well as improve efficiency.”

Jo Galloway, chief nursing officer for NHS Redditch and Bromsgrove and NHS Wyre Forest Clinical Commissioning Groups, said: “It is important for children and young people to receive the right care, by the right professionals, in the most appropriate setting and this protocol has been developed with the input of a wide range of partners to ensure this happens.

“Children and young people’s needs are central to this process and the protocol aims to ensure a coordinated approach to meet their needs.”