- What is the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS)?
- What types of services do they offer?
- CAMHS teams
- Lambeth
- Lewisham
- Southwark
- How to refer to CAMHS services
- The non-crisis referral process
- CAMHS crisis services
- Lambeth CAMHS Rapids Team
- Lewisham Child and Adolescent Crisis Service
- Southwark CAMHS Crisis Services
What is the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS)?
What types of services do they offer?
CAMHS offers inpatient and outpatient services for a wide range of emotional and behavioural difficulties, as well as neurodevelopmental and mental health conditions. Some examples of these conditions include: anxiety, depression, self-harm, violent or angry behaviour, eating disorders, the effects of abuse or trauma, obsessions and compulsions, psychosis, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.
The service provides support and treatment, including individual and family therapy, medication, inpatient care and parenting support courses.
CAMHS teams
CAMHS teams include psychiatrists, psychologists, therapists, nurses, social workers and other professionals who specialise in working with children and families. They also usually diagnose neurodevelopmental conditions such as autism and ADHD (though in some areas this may be through community paediatric teams instead).
In the toggles below, you can find a list of the different CAMHS teams for each borough, and some info about what each does.
Lambeth
Lewisham
Southwark
How to refer to CAMHS services
Most referrals to CAMHS should be sent to the main CAMHS assessment team for your borough, who will then direct the referral to one of their specialist teams listed above.
More details on how to refer to each borough can be found in the following pages:
- Southwark Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS)
- Lambeth Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS)
- Lewisham Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS)
Some CAMHS services can be referred to directly:
- Early Help CAMHS (EHCAMHS) → for advice, consultation, assessment and treatment of CYP with mental health difficulties/disorders
- Maudsley Centre for Child and Adolescent Eating Disorders → for all eating disorders, including ARFID (Avoidant Restrictive Food Intake Disorder)
The non-crisis referral process
Borough community services operate a duty rota during normal working hours (Monday-Friday, 9am - 5pm).
The duty worker will review the referral to screen for risks to the child or young person.
If there are concerns about any immediate risks to the safety/wellbeing of a child or young person, or there is not enough information in the referral, the duty worker will contact the referrer (and any other professionals involved).
All referrals are reviewed at service meetings. They will contact the referrer, and family to inform them of the outcome of the referral.
- GPs
- Mental health professionals
- Schools
- Social services
- Other CAMHS services
- Educational psychologists
- Special educational needs coordinators
CAMHS crisis services
CAMHS also provide services for CYP in crisis, in the hopes of preventing A&E and hospital admissions (although this is not always possible). Below are brief descriptions of the services provided for patients in crisis by each borough team.
In a crisis out of hours, contact SLAM Acute Referral Centre (patients can call 0800 731 2864).