21 parents attended the group

Professionals attending

Pat Howley
Jenny Menzies
Sheila Ramdular
Bev Rolfe
Catherine Love
Susan Crocker

Sheila Ramdular facilitated the meeting.

1. Introductions from the speakers and parents:

Sheila welcomed everyone to the group and everyone introduced themselves

2. Susan Crocker- Clinical Psychology overview

Susan introduced the clinical Psychology service and explained her role within it. The service employs clinical psychologists, a play specialist. There is also a CAMHS team including a child psychiatrist, child psychotherapist. A family therapist will be joining the team soon. They have recently created 2 new clinical psychologist posts, as there were issues last year due to 2 of the team being on Maternity leave, and waiting list concerns.

The team work from the Ark and also link in with the First Steps (CYHMES) and CFCS services.

The parent can make a referral or any professional involved with the child. The child must be known to at least one service at the Ark to be eligible to access the psychology service. Children that need multi disciplinary services can access the service, for children where psychology is the only service needed, they can be referred to CFCS or First Steps. The team will not work with children with dyslexia etc unless there are other issues as well.

They accept referrals for children aged 0-19 years old. Over 50% of all the children they work with are under 5years old. Families are seen within 12-weeks. There is currently a waiting list due to backlog from when 2 of the psychologists were on maternity leave. There is a current initiative to reduce this waiting list to 5 weeks and the team are open to suggestions from parents for ways that they can quicken this process.

They will see urgent referrals sooner than 12 weeks. The team consider 'urgent' to mean where a child is self-harming or harming others.

The service usually holds on average 10-15 sessions with each family. This depends on the families needs. The team are aware that by reducing the amount of sessions that families get, they would be able to see a higher number of families. Susan asks the group to feedback any ideas around this. The sessions with the family may be school based, home based or at the Ark. The sessions are not always face-to-face and may involve working with other teams at the Ark.

Susan briefly outlined the role of Psychologists and illustrated the difference between psychologists and psychiatrists. Psychologists study health and mental health, whereas Psychiatrists look at medicine interventions and mental health.

The most common work that is carried out is behavioural work, for example a child with feeding issues. The feeding would be explored in detail e.g. a lot of work would be spent with the child looking at the process of being comfortable with the texture, smell and eventually taste with food. These situations can take a long time and it is not known how quickly a child will respond.

The psychology team are able to provide a diagnosis for the child, if the family request it. This will be made with other professionals involved with the child and may involve Neurological tests, play based assessments or home/school assessments.

The team also offer group sessions, these are:

• Parenting groups
• Siblings groups
• Complex communication and autism assessment group
• Complex communication intervention group - Next Steps

1. Very positive experience of the clinical psychology service, especially the siblings group
2. More regular siblings groups should be made available
3. It is not fair to limit families sessions to reduce the waiting list as this will stop the service from being so effective
4. Include trips for siblings, vary the sessions so that some are informative/supportive and some are trips etc

1. Very good experience of the service, Childs behaviour improved as a result
2. There still needs to be a more joined up service between other professionals e.g., the dietician did not refer family to psychologists despite the child's eating issues
3. Amount of sessions should depend on families needs
4. Advertise the sibling group in schools, youth centres etc. Improve advertising for the group. Allow adolescents to sit in on some groups, there needs to be some service for them, they shouldn't be excluded

1. Positive experience with the service
2. There should be more work with the parents at the early stages, explaining to them what the psychology service do and what it means. Parents can feel very isolated during the early stages of diagnosis etc and counselling or support should be made available to them. Not necessarily by a psychologist but by a key worker
3. It is unfair to reduce the length of sessions to cut the waiting list
4. Siblings need more provision, one group isn't enough. Explore a sibling room at the Ark where siblings can meet and 'hang out' or talk to other siblings. Something which makes going to the Ark special for them as well

1. All the group have been involved with the clinical psychologist team at some point
2. More should be done with the wider community to broaden the publics understanding
3. Sessions should not be capped
4. Include sibling work at schools, get older siblings to talk to younger ones and pass on information, start a newsletter

• Susan to explore feasibility of providing a 'sibling room' or notice board at the ark that siblings can have as their own when visiting the ark. The idea is that siblings become more involved in the services and have something for them to make them feel special. Susan will feedback what she has been able to put in place.

• Jan Davies talked to the group about a number of support groups that are run at Frampton church. These include toddlers groups, play workshops, 2+ groups. They also offer parenting courses called 'strengthening families' exploring relationships with communities and families. There is also a 'positive discipline' course and a 'made of money' course, looking into budgeting and saving money. They also offer speakeasy and esol courses. Speak to Jan or one of the steering group for leaflets and more information.

• Catherine talked to the group about the pampering day. It is proposed to be held at the new café on Ashwin street, where HFBU offices are. There will be food, live music and a chance to chat. There will also be massages and other treats. Catherine informed the group that it would not be the same style as the last years pampering event but the group were happy to go ahead.