Child Health

Promoting and protecting the health and well being of mothers and children is key to preserving the health of current and future generations.  The importance of protecting and improving children's health and well being is widely recognised.  A number of Scottish Government policy documents highlight these important years and exhort a range of agencies to work together to improve health and reduce inequalities. The Child Health web pages contain a wide range of information relating to the health of children in Scotland.

Mental health problems can occur at various stages in a child's life. However, data held on child health data systems relating to the mental health of children in Scotland is limited. Not all NHS Boards have implemented each of the child health systems and recording of specific health problems, including those relating to mental health, varies between NHS Board and health care professional. There is also often a reluctance to record mental health problems for children at an early age. For these reasons it isn't possible to use these data to gauge the prevalence of a particular mental health problem in the general child population.

Mental health information relating to children and young people, in terms of the following, can be obtained via the relevant sections in theMental Health Summary Statistics page:

- psychiatric and acute hospital admissions
- community prescriptions
- general practice
- workforce information