Until now, no studies have been published about the prevalence and needs of children with a mentally ill parent nor about interventions for this vulnerable group in the federal state of Saxony, Germany.

Therefore, the multi-centre study HELP-S for Children was initiated by the University of Leipzig in cooperation with the Technical University of Dresden. The aim of HELP-S for Children is to identifiy the prevalence and specific needs of children with a mentally ill parent.

All psychiatric outpatients of Leipzig and Dresden at an appointed date will be asked to participate in the study. Patients with minor children will be asked to fill out a detailed questionnaire about the perceived needs of their children and the existing and lacking support possibilities. Because there is no adequate instrument to assess the needs of the children with a mentally ill parent, we will develop a standardized questionnaire by using expert interviews and a pre-test with mentally ill parents.

The standardized questionnaire, which we will develop for this study, will be useable in other studies about needs of children with a mentally ill parent. Furthermore, we will gather information about the prevalence of children of mentally ill parents who are outpatients and about the specific needs of these children in the age of 0 to 18. These results will be presented and discussed during an expert workshop at the end of the project to explore ways to improve the situation of children with a mentally ill parent.