Child and Adolescent Mental Health Programmes
MENTAL HEALTH CLINICAL LIAISON PROGRAMME FOR SCHOOLS
PIONEERING PROGRAMMES IN SPAIN
The Alicia Koplowitz Foundation designs, in a pioneering way in Spain and with scientific rigour, a programme that brings mental health care closer to schools and institutes in the Community of Madrid. The programme is developed in collaboration with the Community of Madrid and the Gregorio Marañon Hospital
Objective
The overall objective is to address the mental health needs of children and adolescents in their school environment.
Design and technical direction
Ángela Ulloa Solís-Beaumont
Clinical Team
The Foundation created the first clinical team, made up of four professionals, which has now expanded to fifteen (psychiatrists, clinical psychologists and nurses specialising in mental health), who belong to the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Service of the Gregario Marañón Hospital in Madrid. The current clinical team is co-funded by the Alicia Koplowitz Foundation. At present, it has been implemented in 57 schools (public and subsidised) of ordinary education, distributed in the districts of Retiro, Moratalaz and Vicálvaro; in Rivas-Vaciamadrid, Arganda del Rey and Villarejo de Salvanés.Functions of the team
The functions of the teams include advising teachers and counsellors to promote both the early detection of problems or disorders and the integration of pupils with mental health problems or disorders.The team also performs a care liaison function, offering clinical assessment (in schools) or pupils who need it and whose parents/legal guardians request and authorise it, as well as channelling appointments in other mental health services that may be necessary and coordinating interventions (between health centres, schools and families).
Extension to special education centres: Multidisciplinary team
Creation of a team made up of five specialists in therapeutic pedagogy, a specialist in hearing and language, a counsellor, a psychiatrist, a clinical psychologist and a nurse specialised in mental health, which attends to the 69 public and subsidised Special Education Centres (CEE) in the Community of Madrid.
WHAT THE PROGRAMME INCLUDES
Services or sub-programmes
Back to School
Attention to students with severe mental disorders, who have required intensive treatment in a hospital environment.
Attends to students
Attention to students with a diagnosed mental disorder and under follow-up at a Mental Health Centre (CSM) or other child and adolescent mental health facility in the selected area.
Identify
Support and advice to teachers and counsellors in detecting warning signs of mental disorder in their pupils.
Assessment and prevention
Attention to pupils with warning signs of mental disorder (clinical assessment and referral/channelling of appointments in care services).
Prevention and promotion
Of child and adolescent mental health.
Research Studies
The Alicia Koplowitz Foundation has designed a research study in collaboration with the Gregorio Marañón Hospital, which will allow us to assess the effectiveness of the implementation of the pilot programme.