Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Bethell on 26 February (HL1564), for those referrals for treatment by child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) what was (1) the average waiting time, and (2) the assessment by CAMHS after the waiting period as opposed to the initial assessment from the referral.
The information cannot be provided because a national access and waiting times standard for children and young people’s health services has not yet been defined.
We are piloting a new four-week waiting time for children and young people’s mental health services in 12 areas to inform the development of a new national access and waiting times standard.
Information is not collected centrally on the clinical thresholds used by services to determine access to treatment or whether referrals meet these thresholds.