Parental Mental Health and Child Welfare Network - Resources

• Top resources for support for Parents with a Mental Health Problem
• Parental Mental Health Issues
• Perinatal depression
• Families
• Substance Use
• Children and Young People Mental Health and Wellbeing
• Education and training
• Reports
• Policy
• Practice
• Research
• Young carers
• Funding opportunities.

If you would like to have your resource included on the Parental Mental Health and Child Welfare Network website please contact the Network administrator.

Top Resources for Families

1. Improving Opportunities and outcomes for parents with mental health needs and their children – A review of the implementation of Action 16 of the Mental Health and Social Exclusion Action Plan 2005 – 2008 Download report (PDF file, 740Kb)

2. Keeping the Family in Mind - Back by popular demand, the 2nd edition is aimed at anyone who works with parents with mental health difficulties, their children and families. To order a pack, please call 0151 708 7323 or contact Louise Wardale at Barnardos

3. How to parent in a crisis. Mind, 2004. This excellent booklet aims to help parents who are going through a difficult time to avoid reaching crisis point. It looks at some of the problems that can arise for parents and children, and suggests strategies for overcoming them. It also explains how you and your family can get further support and assistance, should you want to.

4. Parents with mental health problems. Mental Health Foundation 2007. Brief resource aimed at professionals, children and parents.

5. Being Seen and Heard . Royal College of Psychiatrists. A training package providing practical and creative suggestions about working with children and parents. It contains clips of children, young people and their parents talking about their experiences of mental illness and how professional can work effectively with them.

6. Parental Mental Health Problems: messages from research, policy and practice . Research into Practice. By Jo Tunnard 2004

7. Working together to support disabled parents This report shows how to develop inter agency protocols to support families in which parents have additional needs related to physical and/or sensory impairments, learning disabilities, mental health, drug and alcohol-related problems or serious illnesses. Jenny Morris and Michele Waites. March 2008.

8. Poverty Parenting and Social Exclusion: SCIE e-learning resource, bringing to life key aspects of poverty, parenting and social exclusion with particular reference to children and families.

9. Working with families with alcohol, drug and mental health problems. This report focuses on the policies and practices that can promote integrated services to families. By Patricia Kearney, Enid Levin and Gwen Rosen. June 2003.

10. Parents in Hospital: How mental health services can best promote family contact when a parent is in hospital. Barnados, June 2007. A stay in hospital can represent a significant crisis, not just in terms of a parent’s individual mental health but of family life overall, and may have long term repercussions beyond the period of hospitalisation itself. The findings of this report suggest that this can be re-framed as an opportunity for services to provide more holistic care.

11. Stress and resilience factors in parents with mental health problems and their children. This SCIE briefing focuses on factors contributing to either stress or resilience in families where one or both parents have mental health problems. It considers the position of parents and children focusing upon issues of stress or resilience arising from individual and ‘informal’ sources. By Lester Parrott, Gaby Jacobs and Diane Roberts. March 2008.

12. The Princess Royal Trust for Carers’ Professionals site has a range of excellent materials which address young carers’ issues, identification, policy and best practice.  Please see www.carers.org/professionals/.  Resources from other organisations also recommended by The Princess Royal Trust for Carers include:

• Explaining Alzheimer’s Syndrome to Children advice sheet (from The Alzheimer’s Society):
• ‘Information for parents’ leaflet for alcoholic parents produced by the National Association for Children Of Alcoholics (NACOA).
• Making Time to Talk leaflet (explaining mental illness to your child, from NSF Scotland):
• Parents Using Drugs website – as above, this also offers resources to parents, including key messages from children about how to support them.