Youth demand ‘at crisis point’

The demand on counsellors and therapists working in mental health has been described as ‘‘a tidal wave that keeps coming’’ as services struggle to keep up.

Recent figures show the wait times for the Infant, Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (ICAMHS) in Nelson and Marlborough have increased from 23 days to 48 days over the past three years, among the longest wait times in the country.

Nelson Marlborough Health chief medical officer Dr Nick Baker said the service was receiving a greater number of referrals due to the impacts of Covid-19 along with young people and their parents being more proactive in seeking help.

‘‘Every person is screened for risk, and those with urgent needs are seen urgently. A phone call is made the same day and the help starts from there.’’

The health board was waiting on the Nelson figures, but said in Marlborough, there were 128 patients being seen by the service, 14 were on the waitlist to have a case manager assigned and 30 were classed as non-urgent and waiting for their first appointment.

Those who didn’t meet the threshold were given other options. Children over 12 were eligible for early intervention programmes through primary health organisations and NGOS like Maataa Waka, Supporting Families, Pathways, Barnardos and Explore. Secondary school counsellors and GPS were also provided support.

Baker said some of those agencies had caps on their waiting lists, indicating the level of pressure all services were facing.

New Zealand Association of Counsellors president Christine Macfarlane said the increase in people seeking help from mental health services was due to a deterioration in wellbeing and a stronger awareness of the importance of seeking help.

‘‘What that looks like is an increase in anxiety, depression and psychological distress which was slowly increasing across society pre-covid, but that has increased it even more.’’

She had heard from school counsellors that when young people were referred to ICAMHS, they were not necessarily accepted into the service.

‘‘There doesn’t seem to be any extra funding for ICAMHS or the mental health specialist teams who are seeing more people, but they haven’t the resources . . . so you have huge amounts of people coming to services that can’t cope.’’

Macfarlane said there was also no funding for those with moderate to high needs, who needed therapeutic counselling in the community.

‘‘The overwhelming demand for services, private therapists as well as community services and mental health services is like a tidal wave that keeps coming.’’

She said some people were facing ‘‘dire’’ circumstances.

‘‘We want people to seek help as early as possible so they don’t need hospitalisation in the mental health unit. We want to help them earlier so it doesn’t turn into a chronic mental health disorder.’’

Nelson GP spokesman Dr Graham Loveridge said it often required ‘‘considerable effort’’ from a GP or clinician in order for a patient to be seen urgently by ICAMHS.

Those accepted into the service were typically children with extreme anxiety or depression or adolescents with psychosis or severe mental illness.

‘‘If you are right at the extreme of need,

ICAMHS is great, but if you are mild to moderate it’s hard to get help.

‘‘Which means school counsellors and GPS are left to deal with it, but it is really time-consuming.’’

Nelson MP Rachel Boyack said she had been approached by a number of people, including parents and health practitioners, about the waiting times for the youth mental health service this year.

It led her to raise the issue with the health board at a meeting in March. She had been assured they were working hard to reduce the wait times.