RESUMO
AIM: Young people's participation in their own mental healthcare requires ways for them to provide feedback to their clinicians on how they are experiencing their treatment. Key dimensions of session experience are willingness to attend, feeling listened to and understood, working on issues important to them, feeling hopeful for the future and feeling that things are improving in their lives. This study reports on young people's session experiences over time and by key demographics for headspace youth mental health services. METHODS: The sample comprised 16 484 young people aged 12-25 years who commenced an episode of care at one of the 150 headspace centres between 1 July 2021 and 30 June 2022 and who had attended at least two services. Data were collected via the routinely collected headspace minimum data set. RESULTS: Overall, young people reported very positive session experiences over all the session dimensions. Few demographic differences were found: session ratings were more positive for young adults (18+ years) compared with adolescents (under 18 years). Scores on all five dimensions improved with more visits, and willingness to attend and working on issues important to the young person were strong predictors of service engagement. Better session experience scores were associated with more positive ratings of quality of life. CONCLUSIONS: Young people experience their headspace sessions very positively, and more positive experiences are associated with better service engagement and quality of life. Routinely collecting session feedback gives young people a valuable way to participate in and inform their own care.
RESUMO
Purpose: The 'My youth mental health Session Experience' (MySE) measure was developed by headspace, Australia's National Youth Mental Health Foundation, in collaboration with young people, for use as a routine session experience measure across its national centre service network. The measure fills a gap in measures needed to implement measurement-informed care in youth mental health care. Participants and Methods: Routinely collected data from 37,201 young people aged 12 to 25 years who commenced an episode of care at one of the 150 headspace centres between 1 July 2021 and 30 June 2022 were used to validate the five-item measure. Results: MySE demonstrated high internal consistency invariant over age and gender groups. There was one latent factor of session experience that all MySE items relate to, although this factor does not adequately capture all the information present in the individual items. A significant age effect showed that young adults reported more positive session experiences than adolescents. Conclusion: MySE demonstrated strong psychometric properties and is suitable for use in youth mental health care as a routine session-by-session experience measure. Such measures are needed to routinely inform clinicians of how young people are experiencing their treatment sessions, thereby contributing to better retention, engagement, and client outcomes through measurement-informed care.