There are many effective psychological therapies to help teenagers with depression, anxiety or other mental health problems. Unfortunately, for various reasons, most teenagers never get access to a professional therapist. To overcome this problem, some researchers are exploring the potential of brief, “single-session” interventions that can be delivered cheaply and easily to many at-risk teenagers outside of a clinical context. In The Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, Jessica Schleider and John Weisz at Harvard University present extremely promising results from their trial of a 30-minute computer session teaching depressed and anxious teenagers that personality is malleable.
CAMHS Live provides a safe and fully confidential live online chat service for young people aged 13-18 year olds or for their parent or carer to seek guidance and further information with regards to any emotional wellbeing or mental health issue that the young person may have.
This service is available weekdays from 10am to 4.30pm.
Any emotional wellbeing or mental health issue can be discussed through the live chat and all conversations are dealt with sensitively even if not relevant to onwards sign-posting and information.
The main purpose of the service is to facilitate a referral directly to the relevant mental health services.
Objective: Our aim was to examine the technological and program delivery features of Internet-based CBT and IPT for adolescent depression and to document their potential relation to treatment outcomes and program use.
Open access. Suicide-related behaviours are common in young people and associated with a range of negative outcomes. There are few evidence-based interventions; however, cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) shows promise. Internet delivery of CBT is popular, with potential to increase reach and accessibility.
Conclusions: These data suggest that additional strategies may need to be developed to support families in using telehealth-based parent-mediated intervention in community settings.
Conclusions: The Sleep Ninja is a fully-automated app that delivers CBT-I to young people, incorporating the features and information that young people reported they would expect from this app. A pilot study testing the feasibility, acceptability, and efficacy of the Sleep Ninja is now underway.
The aim of the research was to gain an understanding of how young people use an online forum for emotional and mental health issues. Specifically, the project examined what young people discuss and how they seek support on the forum (objective 1). Furthermore, it looked at how the young service users responded to posts to gain an understanding of how young people provided each other with peer-to-peer support (objective 2).
Many children with mental health disorders do not receive adequate treatment due to the uneven dissemination of resources, and other barriers to treatment. In the case of pediatric obsessive compulsive disorder treatment progress is also hindered by partial or non-response to treatment in addition to poor compliance. This debate paper focuses on new technologies as a potential vehicle to address the challenges faced by traditional treatment, with special reference to cognitive behavioral therapy for pediatric obsessive compulsive disorder. We discuss the achievements and challenges that previous studies have faced, debate ways to overcome them, and we offer specific suggestions for further research in the area.
ChatHealth now receives on average one or two text messages per week. Due to the low number of text messages we have made the decision to cease the service and utilise our resources more effectively in delivering tailored support to schools’ individual needs.
Cumbria County Council is in the process of reviewing the online emotional support offer that will be available for young people; in the near future more information will be circulated as appropriate.
The quality of psychosocial treatment delivery is highly variable in community practice settings, even among well-trained providers. This column discusses the potential to improve patient outcomes by targeting two important quality-of-care indicators through technology: provider fidelity and children’s engagement. A case example describes one provider’s use of numerous tablet-based activities in the context of evidence-based psychotherapy. Providers and families responded favorably to this approach in a recent feasibility study funded by the National Institute of Mental Health. Further research is needed to determine whether this approach may improve outcomes, quality of care, provider fidelity, and patient engagement in community mental health service settings. Login at top right hand side of page using your SSSFT NHS Athens for full text.
We’ve just heard that SSOTP will not be renewing their agreement with SSSFT LKS for library services for this financial year. Because of this we will be reviewing our Be Aware bulletins. Sadly we won’t be accepting any new sign-ups from SSOTP staff and will be withdrawing some of the physical healthcare bulletins that we…
Conclusions: Overall, there is currently insufficient research evidence to support the effectiveness of apps for children, preadolescents, and adolescents with mental health problems. Given the number and pace at which mHealth apps are being released on app stores, methodologically robust research studies evaluating their safety, efficacy, and effectiveness is promptly needed.
Objectives To evaluate the cost-effectiveness of a therapist-guided internet-delivered cognitive behaviour therapy (ICBT) intervention for adolescents with obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) compared with untreated patients on a waitlist.
Open Access Article
Open access. We reviewed the evidence for the effectiveness of indicated individual psychosocial interventions for the treatment of self-harm, suicidal ideation and suicide attempts in children and young people, with a particular emphasis on the emerging use of electronic methods to deliver psychological interventions. In total, 16 randomised controlled trials (RCTs) were identified, none of which included children under the age of 12 years. Cognitive–behavioural therapy is the most commonly implemented approach in RCTs until now, although problem-solving therapy, interpersonal psychotherapy, social support and distal support methods by provision of a green card and regular receipt of postcards have also been investigated. Young people have been recruited into RCTs within schools, outpatient clinics, emergency departments and inpatient facilities. Face-to-face delivery of therapy has dominated the intervention trials thus far; however, the use of the internet, social media and mobile devices to deliver interventions to young people and other family members allows for a more novel approach to suicide prevention in youth going forward.
The current popularity of mindfulness-based practices has coincided with the increase in access to mobile technology. This has led to many mindfulness apps and programs becoming available, some specifically for children. However, little is known about the experience of engaging with mindfulness through these mediums.You can request a copy of this article by replying to this email. Please ensure you are clear which article you are requesting.