Crisis Intervention and Assessment
Our Crisis and Assessment Service offers emergency placements for young people who have been displaced from their current placement or for numerous reasons cannot continue to reside in their existing environment.
Crisis Intervention Placements
Immediate response
We accept young people from any UK location and the service provides immediate, round the clock response...
Placement can be made within four hours of contact and the young person can be picked up and placed the same day.
The purpose of placement is not about containment, but about stabilising the situation, reducing any risks, ensuring the immediate safety and welfare of the young person and making plans with the Local Authority for a more secure future. Placements last for a maximum of 62 days. We believe it can be the start of turning a young person’s life around, giving them a sense of belonging and hope for the future.
An Activity Based Programme
Tailored to individual needs
The placement is structured around an extensive activity based programme at The Meadows, which is tailored to the individual needs of the young person...
Whilst we are able to deliver the best that the UK has to offer in outdoor and adventure activities, we are also mindful that not every young person will find this level of physical challenge appealing and we also enable exploration through creative media, or simply encourage young people to benefit from the tranquility of our unique environments.
Feeling Safe
However short the planning time, we’ll do our best to make the young person feel safe. This includes the provision of escort services where required. This can create valuable shared journey time for the young person and Bryn Melyn Care staff, enabling explanation, preparation, and a softening of the harsh reality of arriving in yet another unplanned placement. It can be very frightening for a young person to find themselves unexpectedly displaced without warning. The Crisis and Assessment Service is designed to minimise trauma and create a positive opportunity for young people to regain their equilibrium, their dignity and their sense of worth whilst plans are made for their immediate future. Therapeutic Crisis Intervention techniques are employed to stabilise behaviour and encourage reflection within a safe environment.
However short the planning time, we’ll do our best to make the young person feel safe. This includes the provision of escort services where required. This can create valuable shared journey time for the young person and Bryn Melyn Care staff, enabling explanation, preparation, and a softening of the harsh reality of arriving in yet another unplanned placement. It can be very frightening for a young person to find themselves unexpectedly displaced without warning. The Crisis and Assessment Service is designed to minimise trauma and create a positive opportunity for young people to regain their equilibrium, their dignity and their sense of worth whilst plans are made for their immediate future. Therapeutic Crisis Intervention techniques are employed to stabilise behaviour and encourage reflection within a safe environment.
Assessment for Future Planning
An essential benefit of the service is the time that it provides for careful assessment of future care needs...
Bryn Melyn Care is highly experienced in undertaking both social work and clinical assessments of young people to support care planning and decision making. With the young people staying for a period of up to 62 days, our staff and clinicians are able to work alongside the young person and to see how behaviours are being presented and the most successful strategies for managing these.
Based on our substantial experience of longer term work, we’re able to provide information on what these placement needs might look like and also, where appropriate, offer solutions. Bryn Melyn Care will be pleased to attend any professional planning meetings during the assessment period, to contribute to and inform these discussions. In many cases, the crisis or assessment placement can be used as a “bridge” to allow the young person to make the transition into a longer term placement solution with access to full time education and clinical input.
Positive use of Outdoor Education
The Crisis and Assessment Service is fully licensed through the AALA registration scheme...
All young people have the opportunity to engage in activities on a weekly or fortnightly basis, accompanied by their carers. Adventurous activities are designed to offer challenge and stimulation and increase various skills as well as promoting achievement and building team working and trust. We encourage the carers to take part in order to develop their relationship through shared experiences.
The idea behind outdoor education is to increase the young people’s knowledge and understanding of the outdoors through various mediums such as rock climbing, kayaking, open canoeing, mountain biking and gorge walking. One of the fundamental objectives however, is to have fun. Sessions also increase the young person’s confidence, fitness, mobility and knowledge and awareness of the outdoors. Our instructors all have dual qualifications in a range of outdoor pursuits as well as care. Although they are competent to instruct young people up to very high levels of competence in a variety of outdoor pursuits, they are equally able to understand their behaviours and their holistic needs. Our outdoor education facility is extensively resourced, with up to date equipment and plenty of modern specialised clothing to ensure that young people are warm and well-protected in all weathers. Engaging young people through such activities can bring about a new level of self confidence that can be transferred to other areas of their life, and an interest in learning which may have been previously absent. Skills acquired through this medium are transferable to more traditional schooling.
(Extracts from Statement of Purpose)
Overall Aims and Objectives of The Meadows
Young people are placed at The Meadows for a variety of reasons...
These may include:
Family and placement breakdown: including birth and adoption families, foster placements and other residential placements.
Young people with particular behaviour and/or emotional difficulties that either makes it very difficult or they choose not to live in a family setting at this time.
Young people who have experienced abuse
Our Aims
To provide a short term (up to a maximum of 62 days) therapeutic crisis placement to young people in need of immediate care and safety, thus affording referring agencies the opportunity to plan for the longer term arrangements.
To provide high quality individual interventions supported by specialist and management resources within Bryn Melyn.
Provide an individual, structured and stimulating programme of activity, creativity, education and therapeutic interventions to meet the needs of young people in crisis.
To respect the individual and tailor our interventions to provide young people with opportunities for personal growth through issue exploration, conflict resolution and afford them a greater level of self worth.
Key Objectives
Whatever the reason, young people who come to stay at The Meadows are presently unable to cope within their current setting...
Our first priority is to provide a safe, warm, nurturing and empowering environment to afford young people the care and control to which they are entitled at this stage in their life.
To achieve this, we:
Provide the young person with a living environment which is suited to their individual needs and which reflects the value we place upon him or her.
Ensure, through the provision of a safe and secure living environment, that the young person is afforded the opportunity to build or rebuild confidence in their coping and problem solving skills.
Provide the young person with the care and control to which they are entitled, offering opportunities to relate to adults who are able to demonstrate emotional commitment combined with professional integrity and safe boundaries to behaviour.
Recognise that “therapy” extends beyond the therapists door and employ a culture that is truly therapeutic.
Promote the young persons rights and ensure their views are represented.
Provide stimulation and opportunity through daily programmes tailored to meet individual needs.
Carry out effective, stimulating interventions and promote partnership with local authorities and those with parental responsibility. Placement plans are consistently reviewed where applicable as part of our quality assurance system.
Commission the services of external consultants as appropriate to meet individual treatment needs.
Ensure that educational opportunities are made available to the young person which takes into account their current needs and potential to maximise life chances.