Michael Tarren-Sweeney – författare

More than half of children either in foster care, or adopted from care in the developed world, have a measurable need for mental health services, while up to one quarter present with complex and severe trauma- and attachment-related psychological disorders. This book outlines how services can effectively detect, prevent, and treat mental health difficulties in this vulnerable population.Responding to increasing evidence that standard child and adolescent mental health services are poorly matched to the mental health service needs of children and young people who have been in foster care, this book provides expert guidance on the design of specialised services. The first part provides an overview of these children’s mental health needs, their use of mental health services and what is known about the effectiveness of mental health interventions provided to them. The second part presents some recent innovations in mental health service delivery, concentrating on advances in clinical and developmental assessment and treatment. The final part confronts the challenges for delivering effective mental health services in this area.This is the definitive international reference for the design of specialised mental health services for children and young people in care and those adopted from care. It is invaluable reading for health and social care professionals working with this population and academics with an interest in child and adolescent mental health from a range of disciplines, including social work, nursing and psychology.

The Assessment Checklist series, created by Michael Tarren-Sweeney, provides the world’s first standardised caregiver-report measures of a range of attachment- and trauma-related mental health difficulties experienced amongst children growing up in foster, adoptive, kinship and residential care. This clinical manual provides essential guidance for child and adolescent mental health clinicians who use the Assessment Checklist measures, including the Assessment Checklist for Children (ACC), the Assessment Checklist for Adolescents (ACA) and the Brief Assessment Checklists (BAC), as part of their specialized assessments of children and adolescents in care.Split into three parts, the book explores all aspects of using and interpreting the Checklist series. Part 1 provides an overview of the Assessment Checklist measures, the rationale for their development and instructions on how to use the measures for clinical assessment, screening and treatment monitoring. Part 2 provides expert guidance to clinicians on interpreting Assessment Checklist score profiles and provides detailed information about several specific types of mental health difficulties measured by them. Part 3 describes the development and psychometric properties of the various Assessment Checklist measures, including information about their validity and reliability. It also introduces several new measures that are under development.Ideal for clinical child psychologists, child and adolescent psychiatrists, child psychotherapists and clinical social workers looking to improve the quality and depth of their clinical assessments with children and adolescents, this book provides essential guidance on professional use of the Assessment Checklist measures.

Mental Health Screening and Monitoring for Children in Care provides a concise, step-by-step guide for children’s agencies on how to carry out mental health screening and monitoring for children and adolescents growing up in alternative care.Michael Tarren-Sweeney outlines unique universal mental health screening and monitoring procedures that can be implemented without the need for clinical training or professional oversight. These procedures reliably identify which children should be referred to clinical services for a comprehensive assessment, and which children do not require further assessment. Informed by recent empirical research carried out with children in foster care in Australia and the Netherlands, these procedures screen the vast majority of children who have clinical-level difficulties for a second-stage assessment, including those with attachment- and trauma-related difficulties, meaning that very few such children remain undetected.This book is an invaluable resource for charitable children’s agencies, children’s service providers, statutory children’s services, children’s social workers, and post-adoption support services.

Mental Health Screening and Monitoring for Children in Care provides a concise, step-by-step guide for children’s agencies on how to carry out mental health screening and monitoring for children and adolescents growing up in alternative care.Michael Tarren-Sweeney outlines unique universal mental health screening and monitoring procedures that can be implemented without the need for clinical training or professional oversight. These procedures reliably identify which children should be referred to clinical services for a comprehensive assessment, and which children do not require further assessment. Informed by recent empirical research carried out with children in foster care in Australia and the Netherlands, these procedures screen the vast majority of children who have clinical-level difficulties for a second-stage assessment, including those with attachment- and trauma-related difficulties, meaning that very few such children remain undetected.This book is an invaluable resource for charitable children’s agencies, children’s service providers, statutory children’s services, children’s social workers, and post-adoption support services.