A landmark study following nearly half a million Scottish children across three decades has illuminated one of medicine's quieter truths: the wounds of childhood rarely confine themselves to childhood. Researchers at the University of Edinburgh found that the eight percent of children who entered mental health services before age eighteen went on to consume nearly half of Scotland's adult psychiatric resources by their early thirties — a disproportion that speaks not to failure of care, but to the deep continuity of suffering and the inadequacy of systems designed to see it whole. The findings
Half of Scottish teens in child mental health services need adult psychiatric care
Hundreds of thousands of Scottish children experience severe mental health conditions requiring intensive specialist care into adulthood, with significant developmental and quality-of-life impacts.