When all is at sea: Attachment insecurity as a mediator of risk in Tamil asylum-seeking children.

Limited data exists on the role of attachment in influencing the development and wellbeing of refugee children. Herein we describe patterning and correlates of attachment in an Australian sample of adolescent Tamil refugees. Sixty-eight adolescents, aged 10-18, were assessed for trauma exposure, mental health problems and pattern of attachment.

How immigration detention harms children: A conceptual framework to inform policy and practice.

Objective: This paper identifies the multiple adversities and trauma experienced by children who are detained after seeking asylum. A conceptual framework identifies the specific impact of immigration detention on the psychosocial development and mental health of refugee children that can inform policy and prevent additional migration-related trauma.

Method: The paper draws on international evidence about the impact of childhood adversity, challenges faced by all displaced children, and the additional negative consequences of immigration detention.

Breaching the family walls: Modelling the impact of prolonged visa insecurity on asylum-seeking children.

Objective: Children in asylum-seeking families are increasingly subject to deterrent host nation policies that undermine security in the post-migration context, however, little is known on the mental health consequences of such policy. This study examined the impact of prolonged visa insecurity on child mental health, by comparing two cohorts of refugee children entering Australia between 2010 and 2013, distinguished by visa security.

Methods: The insecure visa sample comprised children from Tamil asylum-seeking families, while the secure visa sample was drawn from refugee families participating in the multi-ethnic 'Building a New Life in Australia' cohort study.

Offshore detention: cross-sectional analysis of the health of children and young people seeking asylum in Australia.

Objective: To describe the health and well-being of children and young people (CYP) seeking asylum subjected to Australia's immigration policy of indefinite mandatory detention on Nauru.

Design: Cross-sectional analysis of a cohort of CYP seeking asylum.

Setting: Australian paediatric clinicians from 10 health services completed detailed health assessments around the time of transfer from Nauru, mostly to Australia.

Supporting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Families to Stay Together from the Start (SAFeST Start): Urgent call to action to address crisis in infant removals.

Reducing the rate of over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in out-of-home care (OOHC) is a key Closing the Gap target committed to by all Australian governments. Current strategies are failing. The "gap" is widening, with the rate of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in OOHC at 30 June 2020 being 11 times that of non-Indigenous children.

Impact of Covid-19 on the mental health needs of asylum seekers in Australia.

Objective: This paper highlights the significant mental health vulnerabilities of people who have sought asylum in Australia and their additional adversities as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Conclusions: Australia's policies in relation to asylum seekers result in multiple human rights violations and add significantly to mental health vulnerabilities. Despite a majority being identified as refugees, people spend years in personal and administrative limbo and are denied resettlement in Australia.

Community Perspectives of Complex Trauma Assessment for Aboriginal Parents: 'Its Important, but These Discussions Are Held Is Critical'.

Background And Purpose: Becoming a parent can be an exciting and also challenging transition, particularly for parents who have experienced significant hurt in their own childhoods, and may be experiencing 'complex trauma.' Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (Aboriginal) people also experience historical trauma. While the parenting transition is an important time to offer support for parents, it is essential to ensure that the benefits of identifying parents experiencing complex trauma outweigh any risks (e.

Mental health consequences of detaining children and families who seek asylum: a scoping review.

Almost 80 million people globally are forcibly displaced. A small number reach wealthy western countries and seek asylum. Over half are children.

Asylum seeking children and adolescents in Australian immigration detention on Nauru: a longitudinal cohort study.

Introduction: Immigration detention has a profound and negative impact on the physical health, mental health, development and social-emotional well-being of children, adolescents and their families. Australian clinicians will report results from detailed health and well-being assessments of asylum seeking children and adolescents who have experienced prolonged immigration detention.

Methods And Analysis: This is a national, multicentre study with a longitudinal cohort design that will document health and well-being outcomes of the children and adolescents who have been detained in offshore detention on the remote island of Nauru.

The mental health of asylum seekers in Australia and the role of psychiatrists.

There are more displaced people around the world than ever before, and over half are children. Australia and other wealthy nations have implemented increasingly harsh policies, justified as 'humane deterrence', and aimed at preventing asylum seekers (persons without preestablished resettlement visas) from entering their borders and gaining protection. Australian psychiatrists and other health professionals have documented the impact of these harsh policies since their inception.

Ghosts, tigers and landmines in the nursery: Attachment narratives of loss in Tamil refugee children with dead or missing fathers.

Objective: To build an account of how bereaved Tamil refugee and asylum seeker children, resettled in Australia, had processed the loss of their dead or missing fathers.

Method: Phenomenological and discourse analysis was applied to attachment narratives of nine children (aged 11-17 years) and their surviving mothers in families that lost fathers in war-related circumstances. The narratives were analysed through the lens of Crittenden's Dynamic-Maturational Model of Attachment and Adaptation (DMM) and Klass' cross-cultural model of grief.

The impact of detention on the social-emotional wellbeing of children seeking asylum: a comparison with community-based children.

Accumulating literature demonstrates that immigration detention is harmful to children. However, there is a scarcity of scientifically rigorous and reliable data about the health of children held in detention facilities. The aim of the study was to compare a community-based population of recently arrived refugee children flown into Australia, not detained, resettled in a non-urban area, with a population of children who arrived by boat seeking asylum, detained since arrival.

The Mental Health of Children and Parents Detained on Christmas Island: Secondary Analysis of an Australian Human Rights Commission Data Set.

This paper describes secondary analysis of previously unreported data collected during the 2014 Australian Human Rights Commission Inquiry into Children in Immigration Detention. The aim was to examine the mental health of asylum-seeking parents and children during prolonged immigration detention and to consider the human rights implications of the findings. The average period of detention was seven months.

Fifteen years of detaining children who seek asylum in Australia - evidence and consequences.

Objective: To review and summarise the evidence about and consequences of Australia's policy of mandatory indefinite detention of children and families who arrive by boat to seek asylum.

Methods: This paper will summarise the accumulated scientific evidence about the health and mental health impacts of immigration detention on children and compare methodologies and discuss the political reception of the 2004 and 2014 Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) Inquiries into Immigration Detention of children.

Results: The conclusions of the 2004 and 2014 Inquiries into Immigration Detention of Children are consistent with Australian and international research which demonstrates that immigration detention has harmful health, mental health and developmental consequences for children and negative impacts on parenting.

Young foster children and their carers: an approach to assessing relationships.

Objective: This article outlines an approach to assessing the quality of relationships between young foster children and their carers. These children are at high risk of disorganised attachment relationships and of developmental psychopathology given their relational experiences prior to and in care. During a semi-structured play interaction the emphasis is on identifying behaviours of clinical interest.

Children and young people in immigration detention.

Purpose Of Review: This article reviews evidence about the impact of immigration detention and other restrictive immigration policies on the mental health of children, young people and the adults who care for them. We review the implications of this for clinicians attempting to assess or work with incarcerated child and adult refugees and asylum seekers.

Recent Findings: There are increasing numbers of adults and children seeking asylum across the globe and many nations use incarceration and other harsh and interceptive immigration practices.

Culture, context and therapeutic processes: delivering a parent-child intervention in a remote Aboriginal community.

Objective: Little is written about the process of delivering mainstream, evidence-based therapeutic interventions for Aboriginal children and families in remote communities. Patterns of interaction between parents and children and expectations about parenting and professional roles and responsibilities vary across cultural contexts. This can be a challenging experience for professionals accustomed to work in urban settings.

Developing reflective skills in infant mental health postgraduate students: The Australian experience.

Postgraduate training in infant mental health (IMH) was offered by the New South Wales Institute of Psychiatry in Sydney, Australia for the first time in 1998. Since 2002, the program has been offered at the master's level by distance education to a multidisciplinary group of students across Australia and New Zealand. This article considers the various ways that the notion of reflective practice and reflective supervision is used in different disciplines and defines our understanding of its place in IMH training.

Recent advances in the theories of and interventions with attachment disorders.

Purpose Of Review: The present review examines the available literature to consider recent advances in the theories of, and interventions with, disorders of attachment. We discuss the existing evidence to argue that the conceptualization of attachment disorders remains problematic despite their clinical significance.

Recent Findings: Research into clinical disorders of attachment is limited, but there is some recent evidence that a standardized approach to diagnosis may improve identification.

Psychiatric status of asylum seeker families held for a protracted period in a remote detention centre in Australia.

Objective: To document the psychiatric status of a near complete sample of children and their families from one ethnic group held for an extended period of time in a remote immigration detention facility in Australia.

Method: Structured psychiatric interviews were administered by three same-language speaking psychologists by phone to assess the lifetime and current psychiatric disorders among 10 families (14 adults and 20 children) held in immigration detention for more than two years.

Results: All adults and children met diagnostic criteria for at least one current psychiatric disorder with 26 disorders identified among 14 adults, and 52 disorders among 20 children.