All about our CAMHS-Eating Disorder Service
Our aim is to work with you and your family to restore health and wellbeing, there is a life after an eating disorder!
Our service provides support to children and young people within Derby City and Southern Derbyshire areas only. If you live outside of these areas, please contact your GP or local CAMHS Eating Disorder Service.
Here are some questions we often get asked about our CAMHS Eating Disorders Service:
The service supports young people under the age of 18 years old and their families with eating disorders such as Anorexia Nervosa, Bulimia Nervosa and Binge Eating Disorder.
In all of these conditions, the young person will have significant concerns about their weight and shape. Other symptoms include avoidance or restriction of food and or bingeing or purging. The service is not commissioned to see young people with obesity or those who have feeding or eating problems related to other diagnoses where the core problem is not an over-evaluation of weight and shape (such as anxiety, depression, or ASD).
Our team includes people with a range of different jobs, this means that we can provide different perspectives on the eating disorder and a range of ways of helping. Collectively these people can sometimes referred to as the Multidisciplinary Team (MDT).
All clinicians in the team are trained to work with young people as individuals and with their families all together (which is our main treatment approach) and may be involved in monitoring your physical health. We also discuss patients together as a team so that you will have the benefit of different ideas on how to help.
Each young person will have one ED Practitioner/Care Co-ordinator allocated however they may need to discuss things with other team members to ensure the best recovery approach. These may be a combination of the following:
Nurses
Our nurses are trained in mental and physical health and have a key role in assessing and treating young people with eating disorders. They may be involved in physical assessment as well as working with your family as a whole or seeing you for individual therapy using evidenced based therapies. They will listen to your concerns and work collaboratively with you to help you in your journey towards recovery.
Psychiatrist
They are able to assess and treat mental health difficulties, as well as considering physical health and how this impacts on mental health. They may need to assess your physical health, such as monitoring your blood pressure or arranging blood tests for you.
Dietician
Our dietitian is trained in nutrition and provides advice to the family and the team on nutritional aspects of recovery and what food is necessary to help you to be healthy.
They are experienced in working with your family to ensure a balanced diet which fits with your family lifestyle to ensure normal adolescent growth and development and nutrients to keep you physically & mentally healthy.
Therapists
Family Therapist
Our family therapist aims to help families work together towards the goals they identify for themselves – this usually means finding new ways of working together, identifying strengths and thinking about communication and relationships. They may also see your parents on their own.
Cognitive Behavioural Therapist
Our Cognitive Beahvioural Therapist offers a specialised form of CBT focused on recovering from an eating disorder, also known as CBT E or a shortened version known as CBT T
Psychotherapist
With your therapist, you explore your relationships with those around you, making sense of your difficulties, increasing your understanding and working together on your relationship goals. This is important because how we feel is often related to how we are getting on with others and feeling better is linked to receiving support from those around us and feeling successful in relationships.
Administrative Support
Our admin team are a vital part of our service, helping to keep the systems functioning effectively. They may ring you to set up an appointment or be a friendly voice when you call the service.
Students
We regularly have trainees and students working within our team who are supervised closely by qualified members of the team.
Teaching is an important part of our role in DHCFT Health so there are likely to be students of all disciplines attached to our team and attending clinics. This includes medical students, nursing, dietetic and social work students. If you would prefer not to have students involved, please let your team know.
Confidentiality
Staff must keep your details of care confidential. However they also have a duty to share information related to your care with the CAMHS team looking after you and your GP practice. It is often helpful to share information with families and carers. We would always discuss this with you before doing so and would be guided by you in most cases about what information is shared. Very occasionally there may be times when staff are concerned about safety, either your own or others. At these times staff may have to share confidential information with others on a need-to-know basis but they will always inform you that this is the case and seek your permission where possible.
We will often receive a referral from your GP, school nurse or other professionals along with self-referrals.
One of the duty team will phone you to find out some more information and if it is agreed that our team is best suited to support you we will arrange an initial assessment appointment to learn more about you. If your referral is not from a GP, we will generally ask you to see your GP for a physical assessment to include:
- physical observations of blood pressure and pulse (sitting and standing)
- height and weight
- blood test
- ECG
If you have any questions or concerns, we always have someone available on duty from Monday to Friday (9am - 5pm) who may be able to help, advise and talk to you. Please call us on 0300 7900264 and request to speak to the ED Duty Worker.
Our self-referral forms
We will invite your parents/carers (and siblings) to be present during the initial assessment, so that we can get their views of your current difficulties as well as your own. We may then offer some time for you and your family to meet with us separately if it is felt this may be helpful. At the initial meeting we will ask you some questions which can take upto 2 hours. Initial appointments are usually carried out by two clinicians, so there will be an opportunity for you and your parents to be seen separately.
The appointment will also include an assessment of your physical health. This involves measuring your height, weight, blood pressure.
We will also discuss what you would like to be different and how our service could help you towards these goals.
Our aim is that at the end of the assessment you will have a clear understanding of the nature of the problem, be given clear information and, if you do have a clear eating disorder, a treatment plan to take home.
The videos on the First Appointment page have answers to some other common questions you might have.
It is up to you what you decide to share with us. We would hope you do not feel under pressure and we understand it can take time before you feel ready to talk. We will ask you questions such as 'how are things for you?' and 'how can we or others help you?'
Sometimes it can be useful to write any questions that you may have down on paper. We understand that people do sometimes feel nervous when speaking to someone they don’t know, and can forget what they wanted to ask.
Please help us to help you by giving us as much information as possible.
We offer:
- Assessment, diagnosis and interventions on a range of suspected and confirmed eating disorders
- Provision evidence-based treatments including Family Therapy, Cognitive Behaviour Therapy and Psychotherapy
- Intensive support at home is available for those children and young people whose eating disorder is causing significant concern
- A comprehensive transition support package to those young people who are approaching their 18th birthday and may need continuing support as adults.
Treatment may involve different therapeutic approaches, depending on your child’s need. Treatment will be overseen by the care coordinator who will see you regularly, coordinate the care from other members of the team and set up review meetings.
Our Need Help page also has information for other services and people you can contact including out of hours.
Other sources of information:
- Beat - a UK charity supporting those affected by eating disorders with lots of helpful resources for parents and young peopl
- First Steps ED - an eating disorder charity supporting individuals impacted by eating difficulties and disorders throughout the UK, based locally in Derby
- Mind - a UK mental health charity whose website provides lots of information and support around different mental health difficulties including eating disorders
- YoungMinds - the UK's leading charity fighting for children and young people's mental health
- FREED Beeches - a free service for adults and adolescents aged 14 and over who are suffering from certain eating disorders.
- Eva Musby - a parent of a boy who struggled with anorexia nervosa; she has produced lots of helpful information.
