Healthy Beginnings: Developing perinatal and infant mental health services in New Zealand

Summary

Healthy Beginnings provides guidance for district health boards, other health planners and funders and providers of perinatal and infant mental health and alcohol and other drug (AOD) services on ways to address the mental health and AOD needs of mothers and infants and their families.

This document provides guidance on improving the range, quality and national consistency of perinatal and infant mental health services in New Zealand and their integration with primary care, maternity, child health and other social services.

The document is designed to:

• encourage and disseminate good practice
• assist, over time, with the achievement of greater consistency in the quality of services and the way they are delivered across the country
• provide guidance on cost-effective models of care to assist DHBs to make best use of resources.