Self-harm hospital admissions up 22% for children aged eight to 17
This article clearly demonstrates how important it is to get the right level of support at the right time - not just when it comes to a crisis point. Having a real relationship with someone you can trust to be non-judgmental, and who will be there for the long term to support you with whatever issues you need to bring, is clearly vital in changing the current landscape of self-harm in young people.
Counselling & psychotherapy are perfectly suited to working within this space, and there are 60,000+ therapists on Accredited Registers all across the UK that could step into these roles immediately.
Meg Moss, Head of Policy & Public Affairs, says, "it is so important for the futures of our children & young people that we give them the right support at the right time, and that means significantly earlier than the long waiting lists that we're currently seeing. With a third of mental health referrals being closed without those children accessing treatment, we can see that the incredibly lengthy waiting lists are causing a huge problem. We have a huge workforce of counsellors and psychotherapists that is being overlooked by the government and the NHS, which potentially means that many of these children and young people accessing crisis services, continuing to self-harm or even take their own lives, may not have gotten to this point if they had the proper support earlier on".