Closer to home: Exploring the feasibility of including art therapy and music therapy in community child and youth mental health services.
Tracks
Stream 1
| Saturday, September 7, 2024 |
| 11:30 AM - 11:37 AM |
| Room 1 |
Speaker
Mrs Katherine Anderson
Music Therapist
Qld Health, Child And Youth Mental Health Service
Closer to home: Exploring the feasibility of including art therapy and music therapy in community child and youth mental health services
Biography
Katherine Anderson is a Registered Music Therapist working for Child and Youth Mental Health Services (CYMHS) in Brisbane, Qld. Katherine works full time across two teams as part of a trial of creative arts therapies in community CYMHS settings, including working with infant-carer dyads, as well as five- to eighteen-year-olds and their families. She also owns a small business offering group music therapy, music lessons, and early childhood music groups in the community. Katherine has experience working with child and adult NDIS participants in the community with a variety of disabilities.
Ms Manaali Manoharan
Art Therapist
Children's Health Queensland
Closer to home: Exploring the feasibility of including art therapy and music therapy in community child and youth mental health services.
Biography
Manaali Manoharan is a masters level registered Art Psychotherapist (AThr) currently working across two Queensland Health services -within a community Child and Youth Mental Health Service (CYMHS) for complex mental health as well as perinatal infant mental health in a researcher and allied health professional role. Manaali has a background in community, corporate and clinical mental health work over the past eight years. She is a passionate advocate for the field and apart from these roles, undertakes projects to build awareness of creative arts therapy through retreats, research, public and community events, and through her private practice 'Friend of the Mind', based on the meaning of her name in Sanskrit. Additionally, Manaali is a research supervisor, supporting students at the University of Queensland (art therapy stream) with their thesis submissions.
Ms Kate Aitchison
Music Therapist
Children's Health Queensland
Closer to home: Exploring the feasibility of including art therapy and music therapy in community child and youth mental health services.
Abstract Overview
This presentation will explore the process of advocating for a creative arts therapy trial in community child and youth mental health services (CCYMHS), obtaining funding, and setting up the project. The creative arts therapies (CATs) trial is an innovative collaboration between music therapists, art therapists, consumers and carers (lived-experience experts), and multidisciplinary teams in CCYMHS.
A large percentage of young people do not readily engage with psychotherapy, which is predominantly verbal, and consequently discontinue therapy early. In CCYMHS in the 2021-22 financial year, 43% of consumers discontinued therapy before they had attended three sessions. The CATs in CCYMHS trial provides therapeutic options for consumers and carers closer to home, and earlier in their recovery journeys. Objectives include improving young people's engagement with therapy, therapeutic outcomes and multidisciplinary team efficiency. The idea for the trial began in early 2022 with a proposal which led to several funding applications. In early 2023, a start-up grant was received for a nine-month trial of art therapy and music therapy in one community clinic. A microgrant from Health Translation Queensland supported input from lived-experience experts into a research funding application to the Health Practitioner Research Scheme (HPRS). The HPRS application was successful, receiving funds to undertake a mixed-methods feasibility study. Soon afterwards, the trial was extended to an additional community clinic, resulting in the music therapist and art therapist becoming full-time across the two clinics. Additionally, the trial was extended by an additional 12 months.
In this presentation, the project coordinator (primary researcher) will explain the processes involved in setting up the research trial which took two years from initial idea to the start of data collection. The art therapist (co-researcher) will share her experience of implementing the trial on the ground. Challenges along the way included resistance and wariness from stakeholders, lack of established procedures for creative arts therapies in CCYMHS and unsuccessful grant applications. However, effective stakeholder engagement, pro bono project coordination, perseverance obtaining funding and taking a "leap-of-faith" ultimately resulted in the instigation, expansion, and extension of the trial.
Data collection will end in February 2025. It is intended that the findings from the feasibility study will support additional funding applications and business cases advocating the inclusion of creative arts therapies as business-as-usual in CCYMHS.
A large percentage of young people do not readily engage with psychotherapy, which is predominantly verbal, and consequently discontinue therapy early. In CCYMHS in the 2021-22 financial year, 43% of consumers discontinued therapy before they had attended three sessions. The CATs in CCYMHS trial provides therapeutic options for consumers and carers closer to home, and earlier in their recovery journeys. Objectives include improving young people's engagement with therapy, therapeutic outcomes and multidisciplinary team efficiency. The idea for the trial began in early 2022 with a proposal which led to several funding applications. In early 2023, a start-up grant was received for a nine-month trial of art therapy and music therapy in one community clinic. A microgrant from Health Translation Queensland supported input from lived-experience experts into a research funding application to the Health Practitioner Research Scheme (HPRS). The HPRS application was successful, receiving funds to undertake a mixed-methods feasibility study. Soon afterwards, the trial was extended to an additional community clinic, resulting in the music therapist and art therapist becoming full-time across the two clinics. Additionally, the trial was extended by an additional 12 months.
In this presentation, the project coordinator (primary researcher) will explain the processes involved in setting up the research trial which took two years from initial idea to the start of data collection. The art therapist (co-researcher) will share her experience of implementing the trial on the ground. Challenges along the way included resistance and wariness from stakeholders, lack of established procedures for creative arts therapies in CCYMHS and unsuccessful grant applications. However, effective stakeholder engagement, pro bono project coordination, perseverance obtaining funding and taking a "leap-of-faith" ultimately resulted in the instigation, expansion, and extension of the trial.
Data collection will end in February 2025. It is intended that the findings from the feasibility study will support additional funding applications and business cases advocating the inclusion of creative arts therapies as business-as-usual in CCYMHS.
Biography
Kate Aitchison is a senior music therapist and project coordinator with the Children’s Health Queensland Child and Youth Mental Health Service (CYMHS). She has 17 years’ experience in CYMHS and completed her Master of Mental Health majoring in psychotherapy in 2013. Kate’s PhD was recently conferred. Her thesis focused on young peoples’ lived experiences of assessment in CYMHS. She received the Conservatorium Director’s Award for Exceptional Doctoral Research. In her project role, Kate is undertaking a research study trialling music therapy and art therapy in two CYMHS community clinics. She has published four peer-reviewed journal articles and one book chapter.
