Letters
Mental health
Volume 217 - Issue 4

Social and occupational outcomes for young people who attend early intervention mental health services: a longitudinal study

Authors:  Frank Iorfino, Elizabeth M Scott and Ian B Hickie

Med J Aust 2022; 217 (4): 218-218. || doi: 10.5694/mja2.51653
Published online: 15 August 2022

In reply

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In reply: While Wallis and colleagues’ commentary1 highlights limitations common to studies conducted in real world settings, these considerations do not diminish the significance of the main findings. The study focused on young people’s longer term social and occupational functioning as the main outcome and demonstrated that the current treatment model appears to deliver very limited benefits.2 Clearly, we need to reflect on why this may be so and what changes to the service model may be required to achieve better functional outcomes.

Youth mental health problems do not fit well within the 20th century‐bound or physical health concepts of primary and secondary care services. As we have demonstrated repeatedly,3,4 large proportions of young people presenting to headspace services with an admixture of anxiety, mood and more complex disorders are already experiencing significant functional impairment. This is made more complex by difficulties accessing services that match their clinical or functional needs. Delayed access to appropriate care5 and a lack of support for multidisciplinary teams that are focused on delivering engagement with education, training and employment are likely contributors to the poor functional outcomes observed in our study.2

Consequently, we have presented a youth model of care that provides highly personalised and measurement‐based care.6 This involves a more coordinated and connected system that shifts the focus away from providing brief psychological care for those with greater needs to using smarter approaches (ie, digital technologies) that facilitate access to more complex interventions, delivered by multidisciplinary teams.7 We are committed to the systematic evaluation of these new approaches and combining this with ongoing systems modelling for smarter and transparent health services planning.8,9

 

Authors

  • Frank Iorfino1
  • Elizabeth M Scott1
  • Ian B Hickie1
  • 1. Brain and Mind Centre, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia

Correspondence: frank.iorfino@sydney.edu.au

Competing interests

No relevant disclosures.

References

Linked content

  • MJA Research: Social and occupational outcomes for young people who attend early intervention mental health services: a longitudinal study

  • MJA Letter: Social and occupational outcomes for young people who attend early intervention mental health services: a longitudinal study

  • MJA Letter: In reply

View this article on Wiley Online Library

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