15581-m-nanninga

EXPECTATIONS OF BARRIERS 37 Implications This study showed that adolescents especially, but also their parents and parents of younger children, expect substantial barriers to psychosocial care, which may greatly hinder appropriate care seeking. Barriers are mainly expected regarding treatment, and some groups of parents and adolescents expect barriers more frequently than others do. This evidence may provide support for professionals and policymakers in their attempts to improve access to psychosocial care. For example, intake professionals in treatment settings might address and try to find solutions for barriers among children and their parents who received previous care. Professionals and policymakers will also, however, need additional evidence concerning the determinants of expectations of barriers, since our study was only able to explain a part of this variation. Major issues pertinent to this might involve the skills that parents and adolescents needed to navigate care as well as personality characteristics and coping styles. Furthermore, it has yet to be confirmed whether expectations of barriers are indeed predictive of actually experiencing barriers later on in the process of entering psychosocial care. Still, a mitigation of these barrier expectations might greatly increase the access to care of those who need it most. Finally, to support specific types of care, insights should be obtained on barriers related to specific types of care or treatment.