A total of 233 children and young people have had to wait over a year for mental health services in Lothian in 2018. NHS Lothian Child & Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) waiting times are the longest in Scotland.
In December 2018, the latest month that data has been provided, 16 young people in Lothian were waiting over a year to be seen by a mental health professional, which is 9.9% of the 161 Young People who were seen by CAMHS in NHS Lothian during December 2018.
Lothian MSP Miles Briggs has called for the CAMHS waiting times crisis to be resolved this year.
Lothian MSP Miles Briggs has written to the Scottish Minister for Mental Health, Clare Haughey, who has acknowledged that ‘we have not yet seen the improvement required across Scotland’.
The Scottish Government have announced £4 million for improving CAMHS (link).
Miles Briggs, Scottish Conservative Lothian MSP, said: “One of the hardest aspects of being an MSP is people coming to my advice surgeries desperate to get mental health support for their children.
“I have parents in Lothian who have been told by GPs to go private to access support for their children as NHS Lothian don’t have capacity to see them. Children who are in desperate need of support being told to wait over a year.
“Parents and families I represent are beyond wanting an apology from SNP Minsters. After 11 years in office they feel totally abandoned by this SNP Government with the situation in NHS Lothian getting worse.
“This is Scotland’s young people, Scotland’s future. The CAMHS waiting times crisis in NHS Lothian must be resolved in 2019.”
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