Site manager Liz Rowe says they are investing more in telehealth in schools across the region.

“We did a big tour around Wimmera schools over the last term,” Ms Rowe said, “and we went to Edenhope, Balmoral, Goroke, up to Nhill, Kaniva, Rainbow, and a lot of the time we heard was ‘this is great, a lot of people don’t come out to see us and let us know what’s available’.”

READ MORE:

“So they’re the things we’re looking at. How do we close that gap and make it a bit more easy for young people and parents to access services?”

“Four of our (Horsham) counselling rooms have access to screens and telehealth. So we’ve been out to schools promoting it and asking them to set up a room that’s safe and comfortable where we can get the equipment in.”

Ms Rowe said the telehealth option will get up and running in Wimmera schools in the next 12 months, while they are also looking at what community centres could host a telehealth so that young people who have left school can access Headspace services too.

It follows the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ National Health Survey last week showing the number of Australians with mental or behavioral conditions had risen to one in five.

“The highest proportion of people affected was found in the 15-24 year age group where 30 per cent of females and 21 per cent of males had a mental or behavioral condition,” the bureau reported.

Ms Rowe said this correlated with what they were seeing locally, with anxiety and depression related to school and social pressures the most common problems.

“Since the site has been open there has been increase in young people attending our service,” she said.

“I can certainly say we are seeing a jump, but one of the things is it’s probably more in the 15-17 year old group we’re seeing people attending.

“From 20-25 that’s probably a group of young people we need to do a bit more work with and raise a bit more awareness amongst across the Wimmera.”

Headspace Horsham has provided 2167 occasions of service to 506 clients since opening in 2017.