What have we heard recently from young people?
One of our priorities for this year is to increase engagement with young people. Over the next year we will be meeting with various youth groups and attend colleges/universities to understand what challenges young people are facing regarding their health and social care with an aim to raise this to NHS leaders and decision makers to influence change.
Last month, Healthwatch Lancashire visited South Ribble Youth Group in Leyland, and held a focus group around young people’s views of current health and social care provision.
We asked questions around a range of topics to get young people’s views. The group were most interested in talking about Mental Health, Dentistry, access to GPs, and the extra education needed around eye and dental care.
Mental health
Young people told us that waiting times for mental health support are very long. Often, young people become too old for their initial referral to the CAMHS team (Children and Adolescent Mental Health Services), and then have to start again at the end of another waiting list for Adult mental health services. During this time, they told us that young people are not given access to any alternative services to help during their waiting time; they feel that they were just ‘left to it’.
Concerns were raised about the lack of mental health support in schools, and around the confidentiality and boundaries around the support that there currently is. Some young people wanted to be able to discuss issues without it being relayed to their parents and they didn’t know of anywhere they could do that.
A few young people said that some interventions from CAMHS had made their situation worse and felt that they were not listened to about this. There was also some concern about a lack of awareness by GPs around mental health issues in young people and how to support them. They felt that young people today are experiencing a number of mental health issues that were not as common twenty years ago, and that training of General Practitioners has not kept up with those changes and how to best engage with those young people.
Young carers
Another important subject we discussed was the support for young carers in Lancashire. The group mentioned that there was a charity who offered very good support up to the age of 11, but that after that age, they felt that there was no support for them. The group felt that it was very important that more services were commissioned for teenage young carers as support and help has dramatically decreased.
We received positive feedback on local dentists and pharmacies, and identified a need for extra health education for young people around the importance of good eye and dental health. Young people also shared that there is a lack of education around sexual health, meaning a lot of young people don’t know what to do or where to go if they need advice or support.
“We have to work it out ourselves”
Overall, the session was enlightening and very useful. Thank you to South Ribble Youth Group for being so welcoming and sharing your feedback with us.
Are you a young person and want to share your experiences with us? Find out more here