Challenges working with parents with mental health difficulties (Family Partnership Model Level 3)

About the course

Over half of children of parents affected by mental health problems develop mental health difficulties themselves.  Parents’ own mental health difficulties can make it harder to look after children safely, warmly, and consistently.  Effective assessment of parental mental health and parenting needs can reduce parenting stress, safeguarding risk, and intergenerational transmission of mental health difficulties as well as improve family resilience and children’s social and emotional outcomes.    

Based on the Family Partnership Model, this one-day course will help professionals working with disengaged or challenging parents to bring collaboration, motivation, and hope back into their most difficult patient relationships. Drawing on the principle of ‘Constructs’ and using interactive and case-based learning, this course provides a practical approach to:  

• Improve collaborative ‘working together’  
• Utilise ‘quick wins’ to instil hope and evoke capacity for change  
• Crisis management using ‘firefighting’ technique 
• Actively and collaboratively reviewing the working relationship 

Suitable for a range of professionals who work with parents with mental health difficulties, this one-day course builds on the assessment, goal setting, and implementation skills taught in the Family Partnership Levels 1 & 2 courses (prior courses are not a prerequisite to undertaking this Level 3 course). 

This course is delivered by leading parenting experts from the Centre for Parent and Child Support (South London and Maudsley NHS Trust) together with Maudsley Learning. If you are interested in further developing your skills in this area the following courses are also offered:   

• Assessing parents with mental health difficulties (Family Partnership Model Level 1)  
• Therapeutic working with parents with mental health difficulties (Family Partnership Model Level 2)  

Note: completion of prior courses is not required to undertake this course.  

The Centre for Parent and Child Support believes all practitioners have the right and the responsibility to talk about parental mental health.