CL team in hospital

CL stands for consultation-liaison which means "to ask for advice" and "to bind together".

Consultation-Liaison psychiatry is the part of psychiatry that deals with mental disorders in somatic diseases. Somatic disease means bodily symptoms/diseases, for example joint pain or digestive problems.

In Norway, CL teams are still being developed, and only certain hospitals in Norway currently have their own CL psychiatrists.

When working with children and young people and their families where illness affects everyday life, it means having both the illness perspective, the development perspective and the family perspective at the same time. This is where CL comes into play.

The approach is about all problems having biological, psychological and social aspects.

Through the CL approach, the team tries to understand how children and young people, and the perception of other relatives, influence how they talk about symptoms and ailments. How this conversation creates meaning for both the child in question, siblings and parents, and that the child and the family's own resources are emphasized and highlighted. At the same time as the team deals with the physical and emotional, they also deal with both predisposing factors (“to be exposed to…”), triggering and maintaining factors that are important for the course.

The treatment methods consist of, among other things of psychoeducation (through psychoeducation, the patient and relatives learn about the disorder, and how to manage it better), family therapy, play therapy, individual therapy (conversations with a focus on the whole person), cognitive behavioral therapy (cognitive behavioral therapy is based on the dynamic interaction between thoughts, feelings, bodily sensations and behaviour), hypnotherapy (hypnosis), as well as guidance from the healthcare staff.

In a way, CL teams for children and young people can be explained as BUP being permanently in the hospital's children's department, but with specialization and a more holistic focus on the child and the family's situation. Often the focus in the own BUP department is only on the psychological, while in hospitals the focus is only on the somatic. CL team will see everything at once. CL teams simply help the young patients (and relatives) to take care of emotional challenges, as well as to increase the feeling of mastery around being sick/having a sick family member.

If you think CL team could be useful for your child, the child's siblings and/or you as a family, you can contact the hospital and ask if they have this offer or can put you in touch with the nearest hospital that does.

CL team in hospital

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