Clinic opens to help youth

A NEW clinic has been opened by Grampians Health with the aim of helping young people receive treatment for eating disorders.

The clinic will expand on current assistance which includes paediatric services at the hospital, outpatient care, and mental health programs.

It’ll seek to improve access to evidence-based treatment and to provide early intervention for children under 18 who are suffering an eating disorder.

“Although the health service has been providing care to adolescents with eating disorders for many years, this new service allows this to be undertaken in a coordinated, multidisciplinary manner similar to what is seen in most tertiary centres throughout the country,” said Dr David Tickell, consultant paediatrician at Grampians Health Ballarat.

“The multidisciplinary clinic will reduce overall appointment numbers for families and will provide consistent messaging and consistency of evidence-based care.”

Currently, more than one million Australians are living with an eating disorder and the issue affects all age groups.

The clinic will aim to reduce wait times for those needing support and reduce long stays in hospital through an integrated model of care in one location.

As part of the clinic there’ll be paediatric, dietetics, and mental health clinicians and nurses who will work together to provide care.

In the future the team hopes to add psychiatrists, psychologists, nurse practitioners and allied health workers.

“We will establish a dedicated eating disorder service for the Grampians Region that will have the capacity to provide a holistic approach in delivering physical and psychological care at the same time, and will be able to support all age groups,” said Mark Thornett, director of mental health and wellbeing service at Grampians Health.

“To achieve this, we will continue to work closely with the Victorian Centre for Excellence in Eating Disorder in establishing the service to ensure that the most up to date and evidence-based treatments can be offered.”

The clinic is currently open once a week with additional support available at other times.

Youth who would like to access treatment will need a referral from a GP or can contact paediatric eating disorder clinical nurse coordinator via hospital switchboard.