ABSTRACT
All professionals who work with children and young people share a duty to keep them safe (Department for Education and Skills 2003). Recognising and reducing the potential risk of self-harm, suicide and self-neglect is central to our work, and this is with the fundamental aim of improving quality of life
and promoting recovery. In essence, the better our knowledge about a young person, the better our risk assessment is likely to be. Just as it is crucial to assess risk, so too is it important to assess strengths and protective factors in the young person, family and wider community network. This is to inform decisions about whether the risks and benefits of professional intervention outweigh the risks of non-intervention (Ryan and McDougall 2008).
