Meeting documents

To consider this report.

The Chair invited the Children and Young People’s (CYP) Improvement Lead from the Somerset Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) to introduce the report and he began providing an overview of the improvements made in the previous planin recent years.

The report also provided a commentary on the development of a new Strategy for Children and Young People’s Mental Health 2020-2024 which would be drafted and the consulted on in early in the new year.

The Committee heard that a key aim was to address the gaps in preventative and early intervention mental health support for CYP and their families; expand capacity of voluntary community and primary care sector. Over the previous 18 months, there had been significant improvements in the mental health services available for the children and young people of Somerset.

It was noted that these had been facilitated, in part, through increased investment from NHS England as part of the Future in Mind and Five Year Forward View policy directives (since 2015). A new NHS Long Term Plan had made a commitment to further investment for mental health services to improve access, waiting times, realisation of digital options, changing the culture and personalisation. Also, there would be a sustained focus on reducing incidences of self-injury, improving pathway for eating disorders and the importance of prevention and early intervention.

In response to a question it was acknowledged that previously, there had been significant issues in CAMHS/Paediatric services in terms of waiting lists for Tier 3 community CAMHS, and undue discharge delays for young people with mental health problems on Paediatric Wards. There had also been higher than average self-harm prevalence presenting at Acute Hospitals and historic cases of child suicides, which had prompted comprehensive and deep-dive analysis by the Director of Public Health into Self Harm.

Members noted that a combination of development of the Somerset Wellbeing Framework, strengthening in CAMHS operational processes, the establishment of Single Point of Access, increased investment in CAMHS, schools mental health and resilience work (SHARE) had all helped to improve support for schools, primary care, young people and families in the County. It was also reported that there had been no child suicides over last 24 months.

To aid accessibility known as service pathway improvements, there were plans to implement a comprehensive range of digital infrastructure to aid accessibility, transparency, and timeliness of support through co-production/ co-design and meaningful participation with young people, families and key stakeholders. It would be important to continue this work against a backdrop of increasing requests for support / referrals, combined with the lack of prevention and early intervention services at universal and community level is proving a system challenge for schools, hospitals, GPs, social care, mental health services, young people, families and voluntary/community services.

There was a discussion about the development of the improvement and transformation programmes and the importance of keeping clearly defined and separate the strategies and plans. The report was accepted and it was suggested and agreed that a further update be provided in the Spring.