Impact of Ed-LinQ: A Public Policy Strategy to Facilitate Engagement between Schools and the Mental Health Care System in Queensland, Australia

Luis Salvador-Carulla, Ana Fernandez, Haribondhu Sarma, John Mendoza, Marion Wands, Coralie Gandre, Karine Chevreul and Sue Lukersmith
Additional contact information
Luis Salvador-Carulla: Centre for Mental Health Research, Australian National University, Canberra 2601, Australia
Ana Fernandez: Menzies Centre for Health Policy, The University of Sydney, Sydney 2006, Australia
Haribondhu Sarma: Centre for Mental Health Research, Australian National University, Canberra 2601, Australia
John Mendoza: ConNectica Consulting, Caloundra 4551, Australia
Marion Wands: ConNectica Consulting, Caloundra 4551, Australia
Coralie Gandre: IRDES, Institut de Recherche et Documentation en Économie de La Santé, 75019 Paris, France
Karine Chevreul: ECEVE, INSERM 1123, 75010 Paris, France
Sue Lukersmith: Centre for Mental Health Research, Australian National University, Canberra 2601, Australia

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 15, 1-15

Abstract: Ed-LinQ is a mental health policy initiative to enhance the early detection and treatment of children with mental illness by improving the liaison between schools and health services in Queensland, Australia. We measured its impact from policy to practice to inform further program developments and public strategies. We followed a mixed quantitative/qualitative approach. The Adoption Impact Ladder (AIL) was used to analyse the adoption of this initiative by end-users (decision makers both in the health and education sectors) and the penetration of the initiative in the school sector. Survey respondents included representatives of schools ( n = 186) and mental health providers ( n = 78). In total, 63% of the school representative respondents were at least aware of the existence of the Ed-LinQ initiative, 74% were satisfied with the initiative and 28% of the respondent schools adopted the initiative to a significant extent. Adoption was higher in urban districts and in the health sector. The overall level of penetration in the school sector of Queensland was low (3%). The qualitative analysis indicated an improvement in the referral and communication processes between schools and the health sectors and the importance of funding in the implementation of the initiative. Mapping of existing programs is needed to assess the implementation of a new one as well as the design of different implementation strategies for urban and rural areas. Assessing the adoption of health policy strategies and their penetration in a target audience is critical to understand their proportional impacts across a defined ecosystem and constitutes a necessary preliminary step for the evaluation of their quality and efficiency.

Keywords: child and adolescent; mental health policy; mental health care provision; education sector; early intervention; quality; Adoption Impact Ladder; impact analysis; ecosystem (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/15/7924/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/15/7924/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:15:p:7924-:d:602350

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().