Dr. Glenda Kavanagh:

I will try to remember all the questions asked. We have heard many difficulties about the CAMHS. There is probably too much emphasis on what CAMHS can do and what we are funded to do. As Dr. Migone pointed out earlier, we see the most unwell 2% of the population. There is a lack of infrastructure below that. We heard about the preventative piece and more and more is being pushed into CAMHS either because people are waiting or because of a lack of other services - for instance, autism services in this country are very poor. These are group of young people who are very vulnerable to mental health difficulties. We often end up seeing them in very crisis-bound states and they are very difficult to treat because of their difficulties. Without the care underneath that there are more coming through to us. There are many young people using our services who have autism and that is similarly the case with intellectual disability. I strongly advocate for intellectual disability teams that are very specific. That requires very specific training and those in CAMHS are often not trained enough to be able to take on that cohort.