Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services — House of Commons, 2015-02-02
Topic: Health
Norman Peter Lamb (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): Since April 2013, NHS England has been responsible for commissioning in-patient child and adolescent mental health services—CAMHS—often referred to as tier 4 CAMHS. In 2014, NHS England reviewed in-patient tier 4 CAMHS and found that the number of NHS-funded beds had increased from 844 in 1999 to 1,128 in 2006. That has now risen to more than 1,400 beds, the highest this has ever been. These data are now being collected nationally for the first time, but despite the overall increase, NHS England also found relative shortages in the south-west and areas such as Yorkshire and Humber In response, the Government provided £7 million of additional funding, allowing NHS England to provide 50 additional CAMHS specialised tier 4 beds for young patients in the areas with the least provision—46 of these beds have now opened. NHS England has also introduced new processes for referring to and discharging from services, to make better use of existing capacity. A key objective of these actions is to help prevent children and young people from being referred for treatment long distances from home, except in the most specialised cases National availability of in-patient CAMHS beds is reviewed each week by NHS England specialised area commissioning teams and the national lead for commissioning, identifying any issues and taking proactive steps to address them. On 30 January, it emerged that the number of general CAMHS beds available was lower than in recent weeks. In response, NHS England implemented contingency plans, including contacting existing CAMHS providers to seek additional capacity and increasing the use of intensive home support packages to allow children and young people to be treated at home or on a non-specialised ward. NHS England has also contacted mental health providers to alert them to the immediate capacity issues in CAMHS and establish what capacity existed in adult in-patient and community services to take cases on a temporary basis, should that option be required The Government are committed to improving CAMHS as part of our commitment to achieving parity of esteem between mental and physical health—this is not just for in-patient services, but for services in the community, and for services that seek to intervene early and prevent problems arising. That, ultimately, is where the focus must be to ensure that, as far as possible, we spot issues early and prevent them from worsening, reducing the need for in-patient treatment In August 2014, the Department of Health set up the child and adolescent mental health and well-being taskforce. The taskforce brings together a range of experts from across health, social care and education. It will consider how we can provide more joined-up and accessible services built around the needs of children, young people and their families. A Government report on the taskforce’s findings will be published in the spring The Government have also invested £54 million in the children and young people’s improving access to psychological therapies programme and will invest £150 million over the next five years in improving services for those with eating disorders.