professionals
How to Refer a Young Person to CAMHS
When should I make a referral to CAMHS?
If you are a parent/carer and would like your child to access CAMHS, then please discuss this with your GP, child’s school or any other professional who is involved in supporting you.
They can then submit a referral after reading the guidelines on this page. We do not accept referrals directly from parents, carers or young people.
Referral Guidelines for Professionals
The information on this page will assist you to decide if a referral to CAMHS is necessary and what to expect. It gives information on:
Urgent Referrals
CAMHS referrals (for moderate to severe mental health problems)
Services for non-urgent / routine referrals
Please access our North Derbyshire CAMHS referral form here. This is for use by professionals only.
Please send completed referral forms to CRHFT.camhsreferral@nhs.net
Urgent Referrals
If a situation requires a quick response, please contact our Urgent Care Team on 07901 330 724 between 10am – 10pm.
If life is at imminent risk please contact the emergency services.
Referrals to our service are considered urgent if there are:
Concerns that a child/young person is suicidal.
Concerns that a child/young person has an acute psychosis.
Concerns that a child/young person has an acute eating disorder, especially if there is rapid weight loss or worryingly low weight.
Please contact us if you would like to discuss any referral you consider to be urgent but that falls outside of these criteria.
Non-Urgent Referrals
CAMHS accepts referrals for children and young people up to their 18th birthday.
LD CAMHS (Learning Disabilities) accept referrals for children and young people up to their 18th birthday with moderate and severe learning disabilities. Click here for more details – www.camhsnorthderbyshire.nhs.uk/learning-disabilities
CAMHS is commissioned to provide assessments and interventions for those children and young people with moderate to severe mental health presentations. Please see the list of common problems on this website which lists the difficulties that we can help with.
Referrals are accepted from any involved professionals such as social workers, school nurses, school professionals, doctors, and educational psychologists. Please copy the young person's GP into the referral letter to keep them informed. You can download the CAMHS referral form here.
The THRIVE Framework
https://www.annafreud.org/mental-health-professionals/thrive-framework/
The THRIVE Framework for system change is an integrated, person centred and needs led approach to delivering mental health services for children, young people and their families that was developed by a collaboration of authors from the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust and the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families.
This approach has been adopted in Derbyshire and thinks about the mental health and wellbeing needs of children, young people and families through five different needs based groupings:
Getting Advice and Signposting, Getting Help, Getting More Help, and Getting Risk Support.
There are other NHS commissioned services in the area that help young people with mild to moderate emotional and mental health needs at the ‘Getting Advice and Getting Help’ level. This includes:
Compass Changing Lives: This service provides prevention and early intervention emotional wellbeing and mental health support to Children, Young People and Families (CYPFs) across Derby & Derbyshire. Please see Other Support Services for more details.
Most young people find these services help them to recover and be better able to manage their emotional wellbeing / mental health.
For a few young people, further specialist support ‘Getting More Help and Getting Risk support’ from CAMHS is needed.
Please contact one of our Specialist Community Advisers (SCA’s) if you need advice about whether a referral is appropriate for CAMHS and to find out more about alternative local options for support should our service not be able to help.
If the family / young person has accessed other support, or something similar in your local area and you think more specialist support is needed then any professional can complete a CAMHS referral with their consent.
Referral Management
Referrals will be read daily and we make decisions about what is 'routine' or 'urgent' based on the information you provide. If you get additional information after a referral has been accepted that makes you believe that a young person cannot wait until their appointment, please contact us.
If your referral is not accepted you will be informed in writing and signposted to what we consider to be a more appropriate agency. We may also request further information to help us make a decision.
In order to determine if specialist mental health support is required, it can help to consider the factors listed in the table to the right.
Please ring to speak to one of our Specialist Community Advisers or Duty clinicians if you are unsure whether a case falls within what we are commissioned to provide, or whether other services may be more appropriate in the first instance.
