This information is for parent carers of children and young people referred to the Consultation, Assessment and Treatment Service (CATS).
CATS provides a range of psychological services. Some of these are internal, supporting social workers and other practitioners in their work with children and families on a range of issues.
An important psychological service that CATS provides is supporting children up to the age of 18 years who are alleged to have engaged in harmful sexual behaviour towards others.
Our service is led by a clinical psychologist and consists of highly skilled and compassionate professionals who work in a trauma-informed way.
We offer:
- advice and support to social workers and their managers
- direct assessment and intervention for children and their families
We aim to:
- support children, young people and their families to make sense of harmful sexual behaviour
- understand the behaviour as an attempt to meet appropriate needs in inappropriate ways
- help families and networks to support a child to meet their needs more appropriately
- give children and young people hope for their future interactions and relationships
We appreciate just how difficult an allegation of harmful sexual behaviour can be to make sense of and respond to. If your family is considering working with CATS, we would aim to provide reassurance and support. Ensuring you are involved in the planning and decision-making involving your family, wherever possible.
How we work with your social worker
To start with, we would offer to meet with your social worker and their manager to:
- discuss the allegations
- consider how we might start to make sense of these
- develop plans for keeping safe, where needed
- ensure your child continues to be able to access resources and activities that enable them to stay positive and connected with others
We might then offer follow-up meetings to support social workers in their direct work with your child/family.
If direct work from us is being considered, we would arrange a multi-agency professionals meeting. Your social worker will make you aware of this meeting and seek your consent for this to go ahead. This typically includes your child’s social worker, school, and other relevant professionals (for example, for our older children, a police officer). At this meeting, we would review any actions from the initial meeting and consider the possibility of direct work with us.
Following this multi-agency meeting, a clinician from CATS, along with your social worker, would arrange a time to meet with you to discuss the outcome. Where this includes the offer of direct work, we would discuss your thoughts on whether and how this could be helpful, as well as practicalities. We will make a plan together with you that best suits you and your child.
How we work with you
CATS carries out psychological assessments and therapeutic interventions with children and their families. Typically, during an assessment, you can expect us to:
- meet with your child for an agreed number of sessions
- carry out an assessment of their strengths and areas of need, with a specific focus on the allegations and factors important in developing our shared understanding of this
- meet with yourselves as parents/carers as well as key members of the professional network (e.g. education, social care)
- write an assessment report (directly to your child, where appropriate) which highlights areas for further intervention, strengths, a psychological summary of need, and recommendations
After discussion with yourselves, your child and the professional network, we would decide whether it is helpful for the direct work with us to continue. If so, we can offer a range of interventions that are tailored to your child’s assessment and their broader needs (such as learning and/or social communication needs, experiences of trauma).
Our interventions can include a range of topics, for example:
- understanding and managing feelings
- understanding the rules and laws about touch and behaviours online
- making sense of the allegations
- making sense of past or more recent trauma
- building up their strengths and connections with others
We have clinical psychologists in the team trained in trauma-focused cognitive behavioural therapy (TF-CBT) and eye movement desensitisation reprocessing (EMDR).
We understand that not all children or their families agree with the allegations against them. This is a common and understandable response and is not a barrier to us being involved. Nor is an open police investigation, although there are additional considerations in this circumstance.
For further information, contact us at cats@westsussex.gov.uk.
The Psychological Hub provides the CATS service as part of a wider group of support services.