Nursing children and young people in secure and forensic settings

Over the last ten years, there have been signifi cant changes in our understanding of the needs of young people in the justice system, both from a mental health and social policy perspective. Increasing attention has been paid to their mental health needs; this has been driven by the realisation that these needs often go unrecognised and unmet (Chitsabesan et al. 2006; Vreugdenhil et al. 2004) and also because of the long-term psychosocial implications which arise from failure to recognise and address these needs (Maughan and Kim-Cohen 2005; Coid et al. 2006).