£12m centre set to treat troubled children

CHILDREN with mental health issues are set to receive both day and in-patient treatment at a new £12m regional centre that is being created in Sheffield.

The Becton Centre for Children and Young People, in Beighton, will also include new services for children with learning difficulties when it opens in December next year.

The centre, on the site of the former Beighton Community Hospital, will support around 150 children per year aged five to 18, from across South Yorkshire and North Derbyshire.

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Dr Nevyne Chalhoub, clinical director of the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) at Sheffield Health and Social Care NHS Foundation Trust, said: "Bringing the services together under one roof will offer a modern, flexible and individual service to young people and they will benefit from having all the health professionals involved in their care based on the one site."

Previously, children's mental health services in Sheffield were provided at Shirle Hill Hospital for primary school aged children and at Oakwood Young People's Centre for teenagers, as well as mental health services currently provided at Beighton for children of all ages.

The new centre will include a range of specialist therapy rooms, for family therapy, play therapy and arts psychotherapy.

It will also house a school and 24 bedrooms, as approximately half of the children will be treated as in-patients, with an average stay of four months.

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Nick Harrison, senior nurse manager at Oakwood Young People's Centre, said the current buildings had become out-dated and added: "It is important to have a positive and welcoming environment, so that the young people are relaxed in their surroundings and feel comfortable and valued."

Chris Sharratt, chief executive of Sheffield Children's NHS Foundation Trust, said: "We are very proud to have a development of this calibre which will make a real difference to the lives of hundreds of children and young people from across the region."

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