Overview
Fixing Futures is a national review led by the Healthy Brains Global Initiative (HBGI). It explores how the systems supporting children and young people’s mental health work across the UK, identifying practical opportunities to make support more accessible, joined-up and effective.
The review focuses on how services are organised, how children and young people navigate different pathways to support, and how outcomes are measured and used to drive improvement. Its aim is to identify changes that can help more children and young people receive timely, meaningful support, making better use of existing resources.
Drawing on the experiences of children, young people, families and professionals across health, education, local government and the voluntary sector, the review has identified key challenges across the system and opportunities for improvement. These findings are informing practical recommendations and the development of pilots to test new approaches.
Our Approach
The 15-month review combines research, stakeholder engagement and performance management expertise, with children and young people’s experiences at its centre. Young people with lived experience have helped shape our understanding of what good support looks like, where current systems fall short and what needs to change.
Our work includes:
- Journey mapping: Developing composite journeys based on real experiences to illustrate how children and young people navigate services, highlighting delays, gaps and missed opportunities for support.
- National mapping: Exploring geographical variation in service provision and identifying where systems face particular pressures.
- Outcomes and performance: Examining how services measure success, how performance information is used and whether current approaches reflect the outcomes that matter to children and young people.
- Six deep dives: Exploring priority areas in greater detail to understand the barriers children and young people face and identify the operational changes that could improve support.
- Practical recommendations: Translating findings into actionable recommendations for commissioners, providers and other system partners.
Pilots
The findings from Fixing Futures are informing the development of practical pilots designed to test how changes to service delivery, coordination and performance management can improve outcomes for children and young people.
Working alongside local commissioners, schools, service providers, voluntary organisations and young people themselves, we are developing opportunities to test new approaches in real-world settings.
These pilots will focus on addressing specific challenges identified through the review, with clear outcomes and performance measures to understand what works, for whom and under what conditions.
The ambition is to generate evidence and learning that can inform wider improvements across the system, supporting more effective and sustainable approaches to children and young people’s mental health.
The Fixing Futures review runs until December 2026, with pilot development and implementation continuing beyond the review.
