At the moment, the media is laden with calls for reform for youth mental health in Australia. My research informs the debate:

My research specifically addressed the problem of rural young people accessing mental health care. Following one Masters (Hons) and one PhD examination of the problem, I have formed some evidence-based views on ways forward: Here is an extract (Thesis Chapter 5: pages195-197) one that relates to headspace and the potential nurses have to be a more effective contributors to early mental health care if funds were redirected from headspace for a more equitable distribution to help young rural people:

         Implications for policy…

• The national mental health strategy headspace, does not currently possess the capacity to be extended to every rural community in Australia. E-headspace does have some scope to contribute a useful component to a rural youth mental health strategy if rural e-mental health knowledge brokers are available in community rural nursing settings or Medicare Local centres to facilitate this strategy in the rural environment.
• The headspace initiative should be reviewed by the Department of Health and Ageing with an aim to facilitate the redistribution of federal funds to include a contribution to the operational costs of rural nurses to act as e-mental health knowledge brokers for young rural people on a per capita basis, so that at least population-based equity of distribution of youth mental health financial resources is available in all communities, rather than, as is currently the case, restricted to one service centre in one regional community in the study site region.
• Further reform of youth mental health services is required to ensure that rural young people have reasonable access to mental health services in keeping with international progress and development about youth mental health services that challenge the traditional paradigms of youth mental health service delivery (Coughlan et al., 2011, 2013). There is wide agreement in the literature that young Australian people are underserviced in early mental health care, and that for rural young people this circumstance is further amplified (Coughlan et al., 2011; Mendoza et al., 2013; Rickwood, 2012; S. P. Rosenberg & Hickie, 2013).
• Rural nurses should be adequately funded to support e-mental health kiosks in appropriate community settings such as hospitals, multi-purpose health facilities, community agencies, schools and police stations. Rural nurses are able to collaborate with professionals from all of these sectors in such a way that collaboration of mental health helping and capacity building in rural communities is achieved and coordinated. The architects of health, social and law policy will need to accommodate the inclusion of new and innovative roles in the future. In particular, the function, role description of rural nurses, and specifically the role of rural community nurses will need to be expanded so that meaningful mental health help can be provided to early mental health help-seekers.

In press now:

Wilson, R.L. & Usher, K. (2015) Rural nurses: A convenient co-location strategy for rural mental health care of young people. Journal of Clinical Nursing. (in press April 2015).

#nurses #heretohelp