Child and Adolescent Psychotherapists (CAPT) treat psychological and relationship problems within families that affect people’s emotional, mental and physical health.
Child and Adolescent Psychotherapists (CAPT) work with children and young people aged up to 25 and their families and carers to assess and treat a wide range of psychological problems.
You’ll need a keen awareness of people and their behaviour, be able to relate to a wide range of children and young people and work on your own as well as in consultation with others.
To train as a CAPT, you need to complete a pre-clinical course recognised by the Association of Child Psychotherapists. You must also have experience of working with children and adolescents.
The clinical training is a four-year full-time doctorate programme, which includes teaching, supervision, training psychoanalysis and a salaried training post.
- You will work as part of a multidisciplinary team that includes mental health nurses, psychiatrists and clinical psychologists.
- Using psychoanalytic psychotherapy, you’ll take a variety of approaches, including talking, playing or drawing, to suit the individual.
- You will talk to families, carers and other health professionals.
- You’ll assess and treat problems that can be severe or long-standing, and also to lead and supervise colleagues.
- You will be provided with ongoing supervision to help you engage in self-reflection, seek and respond to feedback, and develop your professional knowledge and skills.
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I work as a Child Psychotherapists within two CAMHS teams, one that is specifically for children who are in care, and the other is a Core CAMHS team. I work with lots of other professionals like Clinical Psychologists, Psychiatrists, Social Workers, Mental Health Practitioners, and Family Therapists.
In my work I meet with Children and Young People for Psychotherapy sessions. These happen at the same time, on the same day, and in the same room every week and usually last for at least one year. Children and Young People come to see someone like me for all different reasons, they might have had a very difficult start in their life, they might feel very anxious and sad, they could be getting very angry and doing things that are dangerous to them or other people. Sometimes when children and young people feel these types of things they don’t know where these feelings are coming from and can find it very hard to understand what’s happening for them. My job is to try to make sense of all of the muddled feelings, to help children and young people understand themselves better, and to try to find words that fit how it can feel. This type of work can be slow and this is why we tend to work with children and young people for a longer time.
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There isn’t really a typical day. However it will usually have a mixture of meeting children and young people for their psychotherapy sessions, having meeting with other professionals to think about children and young people, and offering supervision to other Child and Adolescent Psychotherapists.
The Child and Adolescent Psychotherapy profession is accredited and registered by the Association of Child and Adolescent Psychotherapists. They have rules about the amount of continuous professional development that we have to do to be able to be registered. This means we have to attend conferences, events and training, as well as do our own self directed learning.
The children and young people that come to psychotherapy sessions show great courage in the work that they do with their psychotherapists. It is always a privilege to get to know them in a very particular way and be trusted to think together about their thoughts and feelings. Seeing the children and young people grown and develop is always a reward.
You need to be very patient, empathetic, and have lots of resilience.
I would encourage them to meet with someone that is already doing the job and hear about the type of work we offer. There are also lots of events that you can attend to see if this way of working and thinking is something that feels like a good fit for you.
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The type of work that we offer requires our full attention so we don’t bring laptops or even pen and paper into sessions. All of our sessions with children and young people happen face to face, unless there are exceptional circumstances that mean this is not possible which would be thought about on a case by case basis.
My work should be difficult because I am thinking about very upsetting and distressing experiences for people. If my work suddenly became easy I wouldn’t be doing it right. What keeps me going is the support of the teams that I work in but also the dedication and commitment that I see from the children and young people that I work with.
The video below published by the Psychological Professions Network describes the role of a Child and Adolescent Psychotherapist as part of the career map for the psychological professions.
- Association of Child Psychotherapists
- British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies
- NHS Careers – Child and Adolescent Psychotherapist
- NHS Careers – Psychological professions
- NHS funding for psychological professions training programmes
- Pay scales – NHS Employers
- Professional Standards Authority
