Clinician Support to Caregivers of Children with a Mental Health Disorder

The type of support clinicians’ offer and provide to caregivers whose children have mental health disorder is an important topic for mental health professionals to consider in their own practice. The purpose of this qualitative research study was to gain insight in to how clinicians’ support caregivers of children with mental health needs initially and over the course of their child’s treatment. The researcher audio recorded a semi-structured interview with four mental health professionals. The researcher transcribed the interviews and conducted a qualitative analysis on the results. The researcher and research chair identified five major themes from the data analysis: intervention strategies, clinician skills to support caregivers, caregiver stigma, emotional impact, and family needs. Additionally, the following categories from the overarching themes emerged from the data analysis: identify the client, psycho-education, check-ins, tools to use, evidencebased practice, validation, empowerment, engagement, frustration, overwhelmed, relief, grief, emotional needs, and financial and basic needs. The researcher found several similarities and differences between the study’s findings and the current literature in children’s mental health. The findings from this study expand on the research documented in the literature and provide valuable insights to mental health professionals, especially social workers, working with caregivers of children with mental health needs.