Listen Up - Social Welfare Portal

listenup!50 | Chapter 7Delivering a successful service:Providing support at all stagesThe participants in Youth Crisis I saidthey wanted more preventative andearly intervention service provisionto help them find ways to avoiddeveloping more severe problems, aswell as greater sensitivity to their needswhen they were in serious difficulty.All stages of needAll eight partner sites adopted an ethos of patientchoice, giving young people a choice of supportthrough all stages of their engagement with theservice, from a one-off drop-in session, to long-termcounselling, and encompassing health promotion,prevention and early intervention, as well as intensivesupport for those in severe difficulty. All these formsof support are intrinsically linked to one anotheras part of a person-centred and holistic approach.For example, a young person may be havingintensive counselling to help them through a timeof emotional crisis but also be receiving support andadvice to prevent a housing situation from gettingworse – all as part of the whole package offered byan organisation.“I was surprised at the wide range of things in yourlife that’s covered, like finance, housing, eatingdisorders, self-harm and suicide… In the past,although I had good treatment in other places,you can’t just treat one thing. The eating disorder,self-harm and depression and all comes together.IceBreak [The Zone, Plymouth] has achieved that…you’re not a statistic. You’re treated like an individual.”Young personYoung people may initially contact one of theorganisations for advice on housing or contraception,and only once they have engaged with the serviceask for help with an emotional or mental healthproblem. One young person said they had startedattending a service because it was somewhere “tohang out with friends”, and only later had they beenable to access the emotional support they needed:“One day, I let my emotions out and one of thepersonal advisors was there and heard what I had tosay, and we started having meetings, and that’s howshe got around to helping me.”Young personAll of the organisations also placed considerableimportance on helping the young people usingtheir service in their transition from the organisation,perhaps because the person has reached the upperage limit, no longer requires support or needssupport from elsewhere.Health promotionThe promotion of good physical health, mentalhealth and emotional wellbeing is essential to thework of all the organisations. Different approachesto health promotion were taken by each project siteand included:• drug and alcohol awareness initiatives;• smoking cessation initiatives;• sexual health support and advice (e.g. offering freecondoms, contraceptive advice and Chlamydiatesting);• information to educate young people and raiseawareness of mental health and wellbeing, includingself-help and other young-person-friendly materials;• complementary therapies such as aromatherapyand acupuncture to help relieve stress and tension.Offering different types of health promotionfacilities can help engage young people in a servicebefore they experience a crisis. Staff working in theorganisations involved the project felt that it couldprovide an opportunity for the young person to learnabout and assess the organisation, what it offers andthe people working in it, so the young person canbuild trust with the organisation: