Designing mental health services for young people from refugee and migrant backgrounds

Designing mental health services for young people from refugee and migrant backgrounds

Young people from migrant and refugee backgrounds commonly face a range of barriers to accessing services that are not experienced by Australian-born young people. These two documents were produced by the Centre for Multicultural Youth (CMY) to assist commissioners and service providers to better support the mental health of these young people.

The literature review outlines the key determining factors that influence the mental health and wellbeing of young people from migrant and refugee backgrounds. It identifies the enablers and barriers to implementing good practice approaches to improving mental health and wellbeing and provides an outline of the relevant frameworks that have been implemented in Australia.

CMY then consulted extensively with young people, service providers and PHNs to explore their perspectives of mental health services. These informed the creation of the good practice framework to provide practical guidance in designing mental health services for young people from refugee and migrant backgrounds.