Liaison and Diversion Services for Children: A Qualitative Study

• Research type

  Research Study

• Full title

  Liaison and Diversion Services for Children: A Qualitative Study

• IRAS ID

  318961

• Contact name

  Charlotte Lennox

• Contact email

  charlotte.lennox@manchester.ac.uk

• Sponsor organisation

  University of Manchester

• Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier

  N/A, N/A

• Duration of Study in the UK

  1 years, 2 months, 1 days

• Research summary

  Background:
  Children and young people (CYP) in contact with the youth justice system often have complex needs including mental health problems and high-risk behaviours. Early intervention and meaningful assessment is important. Liaison & Diversion (L&D) services provide support through the early stages of the criminal justice system and divert CYP away from the criminal justice system and/or refer CYP to appropriate support services. There is little research, especially qualitative research about the implementation of L&D for CYP.

  Aim:
  The aim of this study is to understand L&D services from the perspective of CYP, families and clinicians.

  Funder:
  The study is funded by the National Institute for Health Research

  Methods:
  a) We will conduct a series of interview with:

  1 CYP referred to L&D services
  2 Family member of CYP referred to L&D services
  3 Clinicians who work in L&D services
  4 Other professionals who work with or provide input to L&D services (e.g. those from the police, courts, health and social care settings etc.)

  CYP, families and clinicians will be recruited from NHS L&D services. Other professionals will be recruited from services which work with, or provide services within L&D teams.

  b) CYP who take part in the interviews will also be invited to take part in observation, where a researcher will observe the CYP engaging with the L&D activities and take notes on how these activities work.

  Analysis:
  We will code the data and look for themes across the interviews which explain experiences of access assessments. We will use these themes to produce a report of the findings which outlines how L&D services are currently running.

  Outcome:
  We hope that the findings from this research will help clinicians to make better assessments and decisions about CYP who are referred to L&D service.

• REC name

  West Midlands - Coventry & Warwickshire Research Ethics Committee

• REC reference

  22/WM/0246

• Date of REC Opinion

  19 Dec 2022

• REC opinion

  Further Information Favourable Opinion