The need for new approaches to mental health

Why new approaches to mental health are essential

Mental health conditions such as depression and anxiety are now among the leading causes of disability in young people. While promising research has been conducted over the last 25 years and services are responding to urgent needs, rates of mental illness continue to rise – and are rising faster in young people than in adults. Meanwhile, most treatment models focus on the symptoms rather than root causes, and prevention is often overlooked.

To make meaningful progress, we need to understand societal, social, psychological and biological risk factors and mechanisms – and how they are linked – and apply this joined-up understanding to identify where the pathways are to intervene to prevent, detect early, diagnose, manage and treat conditions. This approach can enable people to prevent mental health conditions, such as depression, and for those who do develop the condition, to recover more quickly and remain in remission for longer.

Mental health in numbers

1 in 5

children and young people aged 8 – 25 in England had a probable mental disorder in 2023.

50%

of lifetime cases of mental disorder begin by age 14

1 in 6

adults in the UK are estimated to experience a common mental health problem in any given year

75%

of people with a mental health problem develop it before age 24

60%

of cases of depression in adolescents are treated effectively by current treatments. However, 50-75% experience a relapse, even after successful treatment

12 billion

working days are lost each year to mental ill health

300 million

people globally suffer from depression

Nearly 3x

the odds of depression in adulthood following depression in adolescence.

Sources: Goodyer/Wilkinson DOI:10.111/jcpp.12940; Morris et al DOI:10.1258/jrsm.2011.110180; Patalay/Gage DOI:10.1093/ije/dyz006. Wellcome Trust, NHS Digital, Archives of General Psychiatry, The Lancet, World Health Organization, The British Journal of Psychiatry

What the science is telling us

A growing body of research suggests that mental health problems are not just psychological. They often stem from complex interactions between biological, environmental, behavioural and psychological factors over time.

Emerging science highlights the role of:

Body systems, in particular the nervous, endocrine and immune systems, as well as the gut microbiome
Genetics and epigenetics, including how genes are switched on or off in response to external factors
Underlying health conditions, such as chronic inflammation
Environmental factors, such as bullying, exposure to pollution, socio-economic disadvantage and situations that lead to chronic stress
Lifestyle and behaviours, including sleep, physical activity, nutrition, substance use and daily routines

Research also suggests that these influences act across the life course. Key stages including fetal development, infancy, childhood, adolescence and young adulthood appear to shape how biological systems develop and how resilient (or vulnerable) an individual may be to mental health conditions later in life.

This deeper understanding opens new opportunities for earlier detection, better-targeted interventions and more effective mental health prevention strategies – especially when research insights are combined across disciplines.

Even as our understanding of mental health improves, this knowledge isn’t reaching young people quickly enough. Several key barriers continue to delay meaningful change.

Knowledge isn't joined up

New discoveries are emerging across neuroscience, immunology, gut health, psychology and more. But without better integration, it's difficult to connect these insights and apply them effectively to prevention, early detection, diagnosis, and personalised management and treatment - and to system-wide improvements.

A gap between research and real-world solutions

Much of what we learn through research never becomes something a practitioner, policymaker, young person or parent can act on. Turning evidence into effective and user-acceptable practical tools and services requires collaboration across sectors, and that doesn't happen by default.

Slow and complex implementation

Even when promising innovations are developed, their implementation can be delayed by the number and range of people and organisations involved in implementation; lack of knowledge, capacity or motivation for change; limited infrastructure and the complexity of implementation within current systems.
On average, it takes 17 years* for research to become routine practice.

How we're helping accelerate change

At YPMH, we work to overcome these barriers by connecting science with innovation and real-world implementation.

Our approach is grounded in systems thinking and draws on proven methods from fields like technology and innovation management, engineering, public health and change management. We focus on:

Bringing research together

We help connect insights across disciplines to better understand how conditions such as depression and anxiety develop – and where the greatest opportunities lie for prevention, early detection, diagnosis and personalised management and treatment.

Driving real-world implementation

We focus on how innovations can be adopted and scaled, not just tested. Involving key stakeholders from different groups, including those with lived experience, our methods help:

Define the users’ needs and how they are to be addressed
Design, develop and deploy the innovation as a pilot
Refine the implementation to ensure that the operating model meets users’ needs fully
Ensure that the implementation is reviewed and updated to reflect real-world changes.

Turning evidence into innovation

We support the development of practical tools, services and strategies that reflect the latest science and are co-developed with those who use them. We use modern methods, such as innovation management, to engage the multiple stakeholders who need to be involved, to generate effective solutions that reflect the real-world needs of these groups.

Championing prevention and early intervention

By promoting approaches that target key risk factors and root causes, we aim to reduce the long-term impact of mental health conditions and ease the pressure on crisis services like the NHS.
Together, these efforts aim to improve outcomes for young people – from fetal development, to childhood and adolescence, through to young adulthood – and build a future where mental health care starts earlier, works better, from prevention to treatment, and reaches more people.