A dedicated public youth mental health service is on the way for Melbourne’s north-west.
The Parkville Youth Mental Health and Wellbeing Service will deliver care at no cost to the community, in partnership with Orygen.
The service will draw on Orygen’s world-leading research and integrated clinical care and put the voices of young Victorians with lived experience at the heart of this service to ensure it delivers the support young people need.
The dedicated youth mental health and wellbeing service will continue delivering the Orygen Specialist Program (OSP) now available at the Royal Melbourne Hospital.
It will offer targeted primary and specialist mental health care and community services to young people aged 12 to 25 with complex mental illness.
“This is a ground-breaking step in building the vital field of youth mental health, which has been pioneered in Melbourne and scaled up nationally and globally over the past 20 years with Victoria and Australia at the epicentre,” Orygen executive director Professor Patrick McGorry said.
“The young people of north-west Melbourne and their families will benefit enormously from this change, which has been hard won and which I expect will inspire and guide the wider youth mental health reform for the benefit of all Victorians.”
The service supports the vision from the Royal Commission into Victoria’s Mental Health System for a system that distinguishes between infant, child, and family mental health services, and supports young people to seamlessly transition through the various stages of their care.
“The right support and care can make all the difference to people affected by mental health challenges, especially young people,” Mental Health Minister Ingrid Stitt said.
The service will be able to continue supporting 1000 young people every year.
Teams of allied health workers, nurses, psychiatrists, and doctors will transfer from their existing roles to ensure a smooth transition for patients.
Multidisciplinary teams will provide tailored services that deliver assessment and crisis intervention, case management, medication, psychological interventions, peer support, family support, inpatient care, group work, vocational interventions, educational assistance, and intensive outreach.
The service will use the strength, experience, andskills of young people who use the service by involving them in consultations and decision-making to ensure the service is meeting their needs.
Royal Melbourne Hospital chief executive Professor Shelley Dolan said the service would ensure accessible youth-friendly services that were developmentally appropriate, accessible, and responsive, to reflect the diversity of young people in North West Melbourne’s local communities.
“To date the youth mental health reforms have been guided by the voices of young people and have had strong support from the RMH specialist program leaders and clinicians,” she said.
Access to services won’t change for existing patients and the new service will begin operating in the second half of this year.
