Earlier this month, the WHO Regional Office for Europe held its 3rd Mental Health Week, Meeting on Quality of Child and Adolescent Mental Health Care in Thessaloniki, Greece. The hybrid meeting brought together more than 200 key stakeholders in child and adolescent mental health care from across Greece and the rest of the WHO European Region, including young people with lived experience of mental health services, early career researchers, academics, service providers and Member State representatives. Professor Robert Vermeiren (Leiden University, The Netherlands), co-chair of the ESCAP Policy Division attended the event on behalf of ESCAP and was part of a panel discussion. Furthermore, Dr. Emmanouil Tsalamanios (General Hospital, Voula, Greece) President of our member, the Hellenic Society of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry (HSCAP), and Dr. Paraskevi Tatsiopoulou MD, MSc, PhD (Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (AUTh) & University General Hospital of Thessaloniki AHEPA, Greece) also attended and represented ESCAP at the meeting.
This third iteration of Mental Health Week offered a lively forum for participants to network and share learnings around the topic of the quality of mental health care for children and adolescents. Among the topics discussed were two upcoming products that WHO/Europe will launch in early 2025. First, the WHO European Quality Standards for Child and Youth Mental Health Services were introduced, including the methods used to develop them, the ongoing pilot and challenges to implementation. Second, the WHO European Child and Adolescent Mental Health Multisectoral Mapping tool (CAMH-MAP) aims to assist countries in the prioritization of quality improvement for child and adolescent mental health services by providing a comprehensive list of areas to cover during service mapping.
WHO/Europe’s Young Researchers Forum to improve the quality of child and adolescent mental health presented their key research activities alongside the challenges of being an early career researcher. Inputs were gathered from the audience on an upcoming “how to” guide for meaningfully involving young people in the design and delivery of child and youth mental health services. In recognition of their importance for strengthening data in child and adolescent mental health across the Region, presentations were given from representatives of the WHO Collaborative cross-national study of Health Behavior in School Aged Children and WHO European Childhood Obesity Surveillance Initiative. Participants were given the opportunity to network and engage with each other through interactive poster presentation sessions and an art exhibition, showcasing artworks from Greece by people with living with mental health conditions.
Next steps include the launch of the WHO European Quality Standards for Child and Youth Mental Health Services and WHO European Child and Adolescent Mental Health Multisectoral Mapping tool (CAMH-MAP) at the beginning of 2025. WHO will continue to support the Young Researchers Forum on Quality of Child and Adolescent Mental Health and research networks to strengthen and disseminate high quality data.
We would like to thank WHO Europe for inviting us to attend and present at the 3rd Mental Health Week and look forward to continuing our collaborations!
