Description
Currently psychiatric care of children in Estonia is available only to a limited number of patients. According to the Estonian Psychiatric Association 12–20% of children in Estonia have psychiatric problems and only some of them are referred to a mental health specialist. The aim of the project is to provide more effective and accessible assistance in the field of child psychology to children and youngsters with mental problems; to their parents as well as to carers and specialists dealing with children through establishing the South-Estonia Mental Health Centre for Children and Youngsters. The project include promotion of mental health services; provision of training for members of the network and hospital personnel; improving network and prevention activity and introduction of project activities and organisation of research. The main target group is children and families but also specialists working with children with mental health problems will benefit from the project activities. A Donor partner will be included during the project implementation and the partner´s role will be related to providing expertise and supervising staff working in the centre.
Summary of project results
According to the Estonian Psychiatric Association 12–20% of children in Estonia have psychiatric problems and less than half of them are diagnosed at first contact and only some of them are referred to a mental health specialist. Psychiatric care of children is available only to a limited number of patients and funding of outpatient care has not been adequate - either for service provision or development of outpatient services. The aim of the project was to provide to children and youngsters with mental problems, as well as their parents and carers, and specialists dealing with children, more effective and accessible assistance in the field of child psychiatry through establishing the South-Estonia Mental Health Centre for Children and Youngsters. This project enabled to increase providing in-patient care for youngsters in Southern Estonia and start developing out-patient mental health service for children in various counties. As a result of the project implementation a new unit for adolescents inpatient and outpatient treatment was established at the Tartu University Hospital which has 12 beds. Local mental health counselling cabinets were opened in Põlva, Võru and Valga county where trained specialists (mental health nurse, psychologist and social worker) have helped 960 children. Several trainings were carried out for increasing quality of mental health services and improving networking between specialists from health care, social and education sector which have improved early detection of children´s mental health problems. For example 116 specialists participated in the information days where the cabinet services were introduced. Satisfaction surveys showed that almost 90% of patients are satisfied with the services in the local municipalities and staff sees their work as valuable and needful. Moreover the electronical health record was updated for improving documentation of the treatment process at the Tartu University hospital and a guideline was developed for describing the working model at the mental health cabinets. After the completion of the project, established teams in counties will continue their work at the local hospitals and provided services will be funded by the Estonian Health Insurance Fund. In conclusion the project had a direct impact on the availability of mental health care for children and youngsters in Southern Estonia and enabled to develop a new outpatient service model in the health care field.
Summary of bilateral results