Help at hand for youngsters with depression

Dr Tom Muskett is one of only 10 people to be awarded a National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) scholarship.

Dr Muskett, 30, research and development manager at the Northern School of Child and Adolescent Psychotherapy in Leeds, is the only health professional to receive a scholarship in the area of mental health.

He will spend the next year working with a small group of children aged between 12 and 18 with complex issues including depression in a bid to find out more about how they are being helped by existing services and what more could be done to help them.

"These young people will already been in contact with specialist mental health teams but they will not be in-patients," explains Dr Muskett, who trains professionals who work with children with mental health problems.

"They will have a range of complex and significant issues. They may be self-harming and there may be concern about their personal safety.

"I will be spending a lot of time talking to them, their families and their service providers about how we work with them and how we make decisions about what is the best course of action for them.

"I will also be looking at how they ended up taking a particular route and in need of help."

The year-long research project will also look at the grassroots implementation of NICE's clinical guidance for the management of moderate to severe depression in adolescents.

He will work closely with practitioners and service users within three Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) in the North of England to map care pathways for adolescents with a diagnosis of depression as part of a profile of more difficult to manage or complex mental health needs.

By creating means to develop and improve training provided to professionals, the scholarship looks to improve services for children with mental health problems in the long term.

Dr Muskett trained as a speech and language therapist before completing a PhD at the University of Sheffield which examined social interaction in children on the autism spectrum.

"Before I became an academic, I worked for a while in social settings with exactly this type of young person," he explains.

"I think that is why I became interested in trying to find better ways of working with these individuals."

Nick Waggett, operational director of NSCAP said: "We are very proud that Tom has been awarded the NICE Scholarship against strong competition from across the health sector.

"It is recognition of his achievement and promise as a researcher and also of the importance placed by NICE on effective services for children, young people and families with mental health difficulties."