Up to 20% of Finnish children and youth have mental health struggles. Anxiety disorder is one of the most common mental health challenges. Up to 100 000 children and young people suffer from anxiety and not everyone gets the help they need in time.
The State of Mind campaign is organized by The Association of Friends of the University Children’s hospitals. It raises funds for the work done to support children’s and young people’s mental health. The funds raised through the campaign will be used to nationally implement the evidence-based Cool Kids treatment programme and to develop and promote evidence-based methods across Finland. The ongoing project is being carried out by HUS child and youth psychiatry experts with the support of the Friends.
“Friends ensure that children and young people in Finland get the best possible care. We have an ongoing dialogue with the children's clinics, together we identified an area that needs a lot of resources and the attention of the whole society. We also found a concrete solution that directly targets the identified need - the Cool Kids treatment method, which we set out to raise funds for. Children's and young people's anxiety can be treated, and it should be done as equally as possible across Finland" says Anu Rapeli, the Executive Director of the Association of Friends of the University Children’s hospitals.
The internationally successful Cool Kids treatment method will be distributed all over Finland
The funds raised through the State of mind campaign will be used in 2020–2022 to nationally implement the evidence-based Cool Kids treatment program and to develop and promote evidence-based methods across Finland. According to a study conducted in Denmark, 50% of children and adolescents who went through the treatment program no longer met the diagnosis of anxiety disorder after the treatment. The State of mind campaign and the Cool Kids project are carried out in cooperation with specialists in specialised child and youth psychiatry and the Hospital District of Helsinki and Uusimaa (HUS).
Anxiety is an emotion that many encounter in life, but in anxiety disorder, the feeling of anxiety arises easily or is persistent, intense and significantly disturbs one’s performance. The treatment of anxiety disorders is often delayed – there are no clear and easy pathways to seek help in schools, as an example. At the moment, children are usually guided to specialised medical care, which always means a delay in accessing treatment. The vast majority of children with anxiety could be helped in schools with basic children's mental health services through an evidence-based and effective Cool Kids treatment method".
For more information:
The Association of Friends of the University Children’s hospitals
Anu Rapeli
Executive Director
040 149 0032
anu.rapeli@kummit.fi