Infant Mental Health Implementation and Advisory Group: 10 December 2019

Attendees and apologies

Author

• Alex Brown

Present

• Anne McFadyen, (Chair), Perinatal Mental Health Network (PMHN) Infant Mental Health Lead PMHN Managed Clinical Network (MCN)
• Marita Brack, Programme Director Psychology of Parenting, NHS Education for Scotland (NES)
• Alex Brown, Programme Support Officer, National Services Scotland (NSS)
• Elaine Clark, PMHN Nurse Lead, PMHN MCN
• Iona Colvin,Chief Social Work Advisor Children and Families Directorate, SG
• Lynn Cuddihy, (TC), Clinical Nurse Manager, NHS Dumfries & Galloway
• Andrew Dawson, Professional Lead for Child Psychotherapy, NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde
• Matt Forde,National Head of Services, NSPCC Scotland
• Linda Jardine, Director, Children and Family Services, Children First
• Karen Lamb, Interim Head of Specialist Children’s Services, NHS GGC
• Hugh Masters, Chair Perinatal & Infant Mental Health (PNIMH) Programme Board, SG
• Nashwa Matta, Associate Specialist in Paediatrics, NHS GGC / Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health
• Stephen McLeod, Children and Young People’s Mental Health Programme Board (CYPB) SG
• Lesley Metcalf, PNIMH Senior Programme Manager, NSS
• Juan Perez-Olaizola, Consultant Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist, NHS Forth Valley
• Alison Robertson, Consultant Clinical Psychologist, Maternity and Neonatal Services, NHS GGC
• Harriet Waugh,Senior Policy Manager, Perinatal and Early Years Mental Health, SG

Apologies

• Maria Docherty, Executive Director, Nursing, Midwifery and Allied Healthcare Professionals
• Helen Minnis, Professor of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, University of Glasgow
• Liz Nolan, Assistant Director, Aberlour Child Care Trust
• Clare Thompson, Participation Officer, Maternal Mental Health Alliance (MMHA) Scotland
• Carolyn Wilson,Team Leader, Supporting Maternal and Child Wellbeing, SG

Items and actions

Welcome, apologies & introductions

Anne McFadyen welcomed everyone to the first Infant Mental Health Implementation and Advisory Group (IMH-IAG) meeting. Introductions were made and apologies noted as above.

Discussion of terms of reference and membership

A.McFadyen explained to the group that whilst they had agreed to meet every two months, there may be need to meet more frequently.

A number of changes were suggested, and it was agreed that a revised Terms of Reference (ToR) would be sent out.

Action: update ToR documents and circulate to group for review.

Summary of meeting zero

A.McFadyen recounted a brief summary of the IMH-IAG ‘meeting zero’, and stressed to the attending members that the highest level aim of the group was to ensure earlier intervention and access to parent-infant therapy for children and families.

There was discussion on branding, and how to promote the group’s agenda. It was agreed that a communication plan should be developed.

Programme recap

A.McFadyen invited Hugh Masters, Chair of the PNIMH Programme Board, to provide the group with an overview of the establishment and progress of the Board so far.

H.Masters informed the group that after the creation of policy and approval of funding by Scottish Government, the Board was founded to invest £50 million in perinatal and infant mental health services. The Perinatal Mental Health Managed Clinical Network (PMHN MCN) released a Needs Assessment Report which informed the group’s delivery plan.

H.Masters provided the highlights of work undertaken so far; staff increases in Mother-Baby Units at St John’s and Leverndale, North of Scotland community teams, the recruitment of Clare Thompson as a Participation Officer with Maternal Health Scotland, funding allocated to 11 Third Sector organisations. H.Masters stated that perinatal mental health is more clearly covered in the PMHN MCN report and that there was a gap for the wider theme of infant mental health. He explained that Health Board Executive Leads had been mostly established and were coming together in January 2020 to discuss what the future of PNIMH looks like.

NHS Fife and NHS Lanarkshire have been provided funding in the 2019-20 financial year. He announced that £3 million had been allocated by the Programme for Government for funding Infant Mental Health services in the 2020-21 year.

Work-plan discussion

A.McFadyen led a discussion on the work plan which focused on six main topics. She communicated that she would identify leads amongst the group for each area, detailed below, as well as for Risk Management and Participation/Co-Production.

Action: Dr McFadyen to allocate group leads in each work plan area.

Communication plan

It was agreed that there was a need to ensure that Health Boards use the right language to promote a shared, foundational understanding that would support implementation of services.

Matt Forde agreed to lead on the IMH-IAG communication paper.

Structure for planning and delivery

It was agreed that the information to be rolled out across the country should be developed in conjunction with NHS Fife and NHS Lanarkshire, and the evaluation of existing services should feed into guidance plans.

Clinical care pathways

It was agreed that whilst ideally there would be multiple pathways to care, most children are the responsibility of their local authority and so there is a definite need for a link between local authorities and IMH services.

Scoping

A.McFadyen expressed that whilst provision may look different across regions, all IMH services should be connected. Data should be collated from all available sources, as understanding the landscape of services was key to provision. She mentioned the ongoing PMHN MCN work with Rachel Love of the NSPCC, with a final draft being presented at a meeting on 9th January 2020.

Action: Nashwa Matta agreed to create brief paper on ISD data.

Workforce and training

Marita Brack explained that since 2014 NES had been offering Solihull training, and most health visitors had completed the foundational aspect. However, as not many groups had IMH as part of their remit, it had been more difficult to encourage relevant professionals to take more enhanced and specialist training.

It was agreed that there was a need to capture the current workforce and training opportunities, and for specialist and community training to work alongside each other.

Evaluation and impact

A.McFadyen introduced the Evaluability Assessment logic model produced by Health Scotland, and informed the group that a report would be published by February. The report would guide the IMH-IAG in how to measure the success of IMH developments, and provide mechanisms for understanding the differences made in a child’s life. A large portion of data is available at local level but is difficult to collect. The report would suggest what data points exist and which need to be created, and the gaps in Third Sector services.

Next meeting – 19 February 2020.