"Så må vi jobbe tettere sammen" : samarbeid mellom helsesøstre i skolehelsetjenesten og Avdeling for barn og unges psykiske helse ved Sørlandet sykehus - sett fra helsesøstrenes perspektiv

Abstract

The theme of this thesis is collaboration between school nurses at secondary schools in Aust- and Vest-Agder in Norway and the Department of Child and Adolescent Mental Health at Sørlandet Sykehus (ABUP). The purpose of this study is to contribute to better collaboration between ABUP and school nurses. My wish is that the findings will benefit the users of the services and that they will be useful to others involved in interdisciplinary work. The issues for this study has been how school nurses experience collaborating with ABUP, what expectations and wishes they have in relation to this collaboration, what thoughts they have about their own competence and responsibilities in relation to ABUP's competence and responsibilities and if there is a connection between the school nurses' thoughts on collaboration and the organization of services for children and young people. This study is based on five qualitative interviews and has a phenomenological basis. The main finding is that school nurses believe that the collaboration with ABUP can improve. All the informants wanted more feedback from ABUP, they believed it was important to involve school nurses and other parts of the network in the work of young people, and they were concerned about the importance of meeting young people on their arena. Several of the informants expressed that school nurses are involved in prevention, while ABUP is doing the assessment, therapy and treatment. Most informants wanted more guidance from ABUP. It was revealed that municipalities are organized differently in relation to work with children and young people's mental health and that this could affect the extent to which school nurses needed to refer youths to ABUP. Keywords: collaboration, school nurses, Department of Child and Adolescent Mental Health, organization, competence.