We encourage teenagers and young people to be actively involved in their own care.
Our clinicians will work with you carefully to balance your wishes for privacy with the responsibility to keep you safe. This could mean consulting with or without your parent / guardian in line with your wishes, and also based on your age.
Under the Mental Capacity Act 2005, when a young person turns sixteen they are presumed to have “capacity” unless there is clear evidence that this is not the case.
Your mental capacity means your ability to understand information and make decisions about your life. It can also mean the ability to communicate decisions about your life. Your capacity to make a decision can vary depending on the time that the decision needs to be made and the type of decision you need to make.
This means that legally, once you are sixteen years old, we cannot share information with anyone else, or allow anyone else to make any decisions regarding your healthcare without your consent, unless there is clear evidence to suggest that you lack capacity. If you are over 16, and would like to give consent for someone else to speak to us about your care, please see here.
See our Services for Teens and Young People page for additional resources and links.
