Our Community Engagement Coordinator and Clinical Manager were invited to the Metro North Hospital and Health Service's Community Engagement Forum to present on the mental health of young people in Brisbane North.

We feel super privileged to have had the opportunity to share our experience with our Hospital and Health partners and are so excited to continue working together to support young people in Brisbane’s North.

So, what did we talk about?

We started off by showing why it’s important to highlight youth mental health specifically. Not only are young people the future but research by headspace has shown that 34% of young Australians are reporting high or very high levels of distress, and that 75% of mental health disorders emerge before the age of 25.

That’s why at headspace, we work with young people 12-25, so that we can provide the early intervention support that might help a young person get their life back on track.

This year has been challenging for everyone, with many people and organisations having to adapt to a completely new landscape and we were no different. In a very, very short period, we had to adapt our services from being face to face, to most of our appointments being held over the phone or online. This wasn’t an easy transition and our administration and intake teams did an incredible job to make it as smooth as possible.

Looking to the positives, this transition gave us the opportunity to look at whether telehealth services worked on such a large scale. What we found is 78% of young people who accessed these services said it was suitable for their needs, and 89% of our clinicians felt it was an effective way for them to deliver services. Further, 94% of young people said they still had a positive experience with headspace when using telehealth services. We’ve even heard feedback from young people that they found it easier to open up about what’s going on for them from the comfort of their space.

None of this would have been possible without the support and guidance of our Youth Reference Group. Throughout this year they have guided our work and participated in various projects that have allowed us to continue to engage with our community and provide mental health literacy to young people.