Table 6 Main category – Collaboration in action

An ongoing personal relationship

I feel I’ve got a strong relationship with those who work on the Child Protection Team, because they’re not that many and it’s not that high turnover.

The good thing is that they have a staff turnover within The Child Protection Team which is sustainable over time. Basically, we have met the same people since I started working here and we established a contact with The Child Protection Team, until this day.

It is a nice environment when you arrive. The staff are very nice, both at the reception and when you call them. They really make you feel, both me as a social worker and the children and adolescents, to feel seen. They listen very well. They are accommodating there, which I think is very important. That the children and adolescents, when we arrive with them, they feel comfortable and that they do not feel that it is difficult.

Working across the silos

The purpose is to get a holistic assessment like that you see... all the different perspectives of a child, both physically and mentally. But also, what we bring with us, knowledge of the family and social difficulties and so on. So that they are assessing health on the basis of every possible … in all perspectives as well.

If I could wish for something and be a little spoiled, or what to say. So, I would like, when we have contact with The Child Protection Team, it is, after all, it is the social service that will requisition all... information. Journals from the Child Welfare Centre and from school and also from public dental care and from other, other county councils and so on. And I think that is... partly it will be like a detour. Because we are going to require all that, and then we will send the material to the Child Protection Team. I could wish for that The Child Protection Team had a holistic perspective on it, so that they were the ones who acquired those records.

A committed medical team

One thing that I think is important with the Child Protection Team is that by having the focus that they have on the child, being loyal in that way, they have made it possible, from what I have seen, that they have enabled the children to become more responsive to care. Because many of the children that I meet are very far away from public society and health care. (…) And kids who weren’t open at all to psychotherapy and situations when it is hard to just go to a regular doctor. Concerning things like that they have, due to how nurses, doctors and psychologists have treated them, they have become much more responsive to care. I think it has been a very positive experience for them to have doctors, nurses, psychologists who have an understanding for them as children in this situation. And that they can meet them, with that knowledge.

They do not let go like “oh well, our job here is done” and then they let go, but they make follow-ups and makes sure that the youth really get what they need.

Rights and responsibilities

I think it’s also a way to protect them, the most vulnerable children in the society, to make sure they get the help and support they need.

To meet the responsibility you take as a society. So to say, when you grant a placement or care for a child.

It is for the legal security of the children. That they should be... their health status when entering social care, it should be investigated. What illnesses they have, if they have been hurt by anything or also in terms of care, that it should be investigated, in what way it has occurred. And mental health problems too, that since children who see violence or are subjected to violence it is also... an issue for The Child Protection Team to help us. For the child to receive support, later, and then as said the legal security as well. For both the authority and the child. And the family.