Our mental health support teams (MHST) help young people at school and college, who are experiencing mental health difficulties such as anxiety and low mood.

This page is a guide for parents and carers, you can also read our:

Our mental health support teams are a partnership between Pennine Care NHS and specialist mental health organisations. We cover schools and colleges in Bury, Heywood, Middleton and Rochdale, Oldham, Stockport and Tameside.

These links have more details about each local team, schools and colleges we work with, partner organisations, and contact details:

  • Bury
  • Heywood, Middleton and Rochdale
  • Oldham
  • Stockport
  • Tameside

We can help with mild to moderate mental health difficulties, such as anxiety and low mood. This means problems that are starting to affect your child's everyday life but can often improve with early help.

There are three main ways we help:

  • One-to-one or group therapy or skills sessions for you and your child
  • Advice or signposting to other services who can help you and your child
  • Support for school or college around the wellbeing of your child, other pupils and staff

It is important to know you and your family are happy to receive support from us, therefore we need your consent in advance.

Your information will remain confidential at all times. We will explain who we will share your information with.

Information sharing

Usually, we will only share information about you and your family with your permission. There may be a need to share without asking you first, for example if we think there is a risk to your wellbeing or a safeguarding concern; or if we are required to by law.

Where we use your information to review the performance of the service or write reports and communications, your information will be anonymised so that no-one will know it’s about you.

Any information about you will be treated confidentially and in accordance with data protection legislation.

Your information will be held securely on Pennine Care’s electronic record.

Information about how your information is processed is available at: penninecare.nhs.uk/yourinformation

Mental health support teams are part of the child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) within Pennine Care NHS Foundation Trust.

We use the same electronic records system as CAMHS. When consenting to a referral, you are agreeing that information held on our electronic records system can be shared with school as part of the consultation and assessment process.

Your child can be referred to us by the mental health lead or link worker at school, if they need support.

These are the next steps:

  1. Consent is given by you and your child
  2. School discusses your child’s needs with us
  3. As a team, we discuss what may be helpful
  4. We feedback to school with suggestions

If we feel your child would benefit from one-to-one or a group session, we will contact you directly.

If you haven’t heard from us or your school within 4 weeks, please contact your school for an update.

If your child’s referral to us is accepted, an assessment will take place.

This assessment is not a test or an exam. It's a conversation with your child to gather information to understand what kind of support they might need.

Our mental health practitioner will also contact you to discuss your understanding of your child’s needs.

This helps us better understand what support will be most beneficial for your child.

Your child’s safety is important to us and we will support you by conducting a thorough risk assessment in our initial meeting.

This involves exploring different elements of risk. This will be around self-harm, thoughts or plans of suicide, and risk to and from others.

A safety plan is agreed with your child and shared with key adults.

We will usually offer you 6 to 8 sessions, lasting between 30- 60 minutes. These a with a mental health practitioner.

Sessions can either be with your child or with you, as a parent or carer.

In some cases, it is more appropriate to work with you on a one-to-one basis, especially if your child is younger.

Sessions are informed by cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), which aims to change unhelpful thoughts and behaviours. It can provide tools and strategies for common mental health needs in school.

If you have any questions or concerns about any of the information you have read on this page, please speak to your
school’s mental health lead, and/or your mental health practitioner.

Our CAMHS resources page has a range of websites, apps, guides and information offering help, support and advice.

You can also find more information on wellbeing at: penninecare.nhs.uk/wellbeing

For any urgent help and advice, call NHS 111 and choose the mental health option 2.