FRONTLINE youth mental health workers will meet next week to drive a collaborative approach to improve well-being in young people across the region.
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Ballarat Community Health is hosting the closed forum for industry specialists and advocates, led by VicHealth mental well-being manager Irene Verins.
Youth mental health was put in the spotlight earlier this month with reports of rising numbers of suicidal and self-harming Australian adolescents presenting to hospital emergency departments. Leading adolescent and mental health experts warned systems were failing the nation’s teenagers.
Mental health presentations in Victorian emergency departments tripled among 10 to 19-year-olds between 2008-2015, according to new data published in Medical Journal of Australia. This increase exceeded the rise in physical presentations for the same age group – 46 per cent compared to 13 per cent.
Self-harm cases had risen by 53 per cent.
More than three-quarters of all the mental health-related presentations were among 15-19 year olds in 2014-2015.
The Ballarat Community Health forum is designed to build on the organisation’s 2017-21 youth mental health and well-being strategy.
BCH has taken the lead on overseeing national youth mental health initiative headspace in Ballarat since 2016. It does so with the support of a consortium, including Ballarat Health Services, Centacare, St John of God Hospital, Mind Australia and Uniting Care Ballarat.
BCH’s strategic plan aims to work closely with community partners to help Ballarat’s young people realise their potential, cope with everyday stresses, be productive in education or work, and to make a positive community contribution.
The BCH report details adolescence as a time of great change and challenges for young people. It cites suicide as the leading cause of death for young people aged 15-24 years (Australian Bureau of Statistics).
BCH has issued a focus on strategies to build resilience among young people to promote positively adapting to young people’s mental health and well-being.
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