Milton Keynes Wellbeing Service

The CHUMS MK Wellbeing Service is a small team dedicated to using active outreach to engage with families and youth organisations (i.e. schools / Scouts) to reach as many people as we can. Our early intervention focus means we support:

Prevention

For those who want to:

• Learn more about emotional wellbeing difficulties
• Apply theory to everyday life
• Take action before concerns become difficulties

Early Intervention

• “Guided self-help” for families and young people who want ideas / strategies for change and need a little help to think about how to apply the strategies in their lives to reach their goal
• Families when they are starting to experience emotional wellbeing difficulties (i.e. 6 months to a year) and want support to prevent escalation

We discuss the needs of children and young people on a case-by-case basis and therefore the following are guidelines and not an exhaustive list to help ensure timely, relevant, effective person-centred care.

Referrals are suitable when child/young person is presenting with a difficulty in one or two areas but generally functioning well. The need should be for targeted and goal focused support and not accompanied by long term complexities.

Instead of tiers or levels, i-THRIVE uses five groups to describe the kind of help a child or young person might need:

1. Getting Advice

i-THRIVE is a way of organising mental health services based on needs, not diagnosis or severity alone. It’s designed to be child-centred, family-friendly, and collaborative.

• For children and families who need information, guidance, or reassurance.
• Support might come from CHUMS, school staff, GPs, or online resources.
• Example: A child feeling anxious before exams might benefit from coping strategies and reassurance.

2. Getting Help

• For those with mild to moderate mental health difficulties (please see definitions below)
• Help is goal-focused and time-limited, like CBT or counselling.
• Example: A young person with low mood who is still attending school but struggling socially.

3. Getting More Help

• For children with more complex or enduring difficulties.
• Support might include specialist services, longer-term therapy, or multi-agency input.
• Example: A child with persistent OCD or anxiety that affects daily functioning.

4. Getting Risk Support

• For children whose needs cannot be met through treatment alone, often due to high risk or complexity.
• Focus is on safety and support, even if the child isn’t ready or able to engage in therapy.
• Example: A young person with frequent suicidal thoughts and self-harm, needing crisis support.

N.B: Risk assessment, formulation and management is everyone’s responsibility. CHUMS are part of this process and if a risk is identified we will help CYP and families to access support from the appropriate service accordingly.

5. Thriving

• For children who are doing well and don’t need mental health support.
• Services focus on prevention and resilience, like school wellbeing programs.
• Example: A child who has recovered from previous difficulties and is thriving with support from family and school.

Getting Help support covers a range of needs and difficulties and sometimes it can be hard to determine which is the best organisation to provide support, especially for those that require more targeted support and are experiencing “moderate difficulties”.

As mentioned before, we consider needs on a case-by-case basis and try to understand difficulties within that young person’s day to day life, including family, school etc.

Below are some examples and approximate definitions to help understand young people’s needs in relation to potential services/support and the factors that practitioners consider when making decisions about care. Please be aware that this is not an exhaustive list but is a guide for assessing need and discussing formulations.

1. Complexity: The presenting needs indicate that either an MDT approach or a long-term intervention or specialist intervention may be more suitable i.e., where there is a history of significant domestic violence and/children’s service input (complex transgenerational family safeguarding concerns), where significant developmental trauma is suspected or there are multiple contextual factors impacting on a complex mental health presentation or co-occurring difficulties (e.g., gender dysphoria, Autism, attachment difficulties). This might be indicated by the involvement of children’s social care, CAMHS or multiple professionals.
2. Risk: When clarification is required, or the level of need in terms of risk is not suitable for brief interventions, e.g., suicidal ideation with clear plan and intent, previous suicidal attempts and means.
3. Relevance and appropriateness: The referral meets the eligibility criteria for another (specialist) service and there is evidence that a better outcome will be achieved by the other service e.g. PTSD trauma, SEND, counselling, paediatric psychology etc
4. Presenting need: The referral has no evidence of mental health difficulties but could be explained by other constant or ongoing predisposing, precipitating or perpetuating factors e.g. parenting, difficult socio-economic contexts or a neurodevelopmental difficulty. 
5. Timing: The family are unable to engage with or do not desire a time limited, brief solution focused approach.