The Bay of Plenty Intensive Clinical Service is based in Tauaranga and provides services to families in the Eastern and Western Bay of Plenty districts  It offers interventions to families who are caring for young people with severe behavioural problems. Unlike clinic based services, it involves a mobile, intensive team of clinicians and a supervisor who works with families in their homes and/ or community settings. This empowers these families to cope with any issues that may arise, in the environment in which they occur.

Bay of Plenty Intensive Clinical Family Service

The team practices Functional Family Therapy (FFT), which is a family focused intervention model aimed at children between the ages of 10 and 18. Interventions are for a relatively short duration, ranging from 8-12 family therapy sessions for mild conduct problems and up to 20-30 therapy sessions for more complex situations.

Service Focus
The service aims to:
1. Reduce problematic referral behaviours, increase knowledge and skills, and improve problem solving capabilities,
2. Improve family/ whanau communication and therefore improve family relationships
3. Apply the young person’s new behaviours across all problematic settings (i.e. home, school, and community). This will be achieved by assisting the family to appropriately access and utilise local resources.

Referrals
Referrals are received from the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS and Voyagers) and /or local CYFS offices. Please note that young persons referred must have a mental health diagnosis.

For more information about FFT, or if you would like to talk to someone about making a referral in the Bay of Plenty area, please contact Jan Bell on 07 5752639 ext 374 / 029 4323 897 or by email at janb@youthorizons.org.nz