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The Parkville Youth Mental Health and Wellbeing Service (PYMHWS) is Victoria’s first dedicated public youth mental health service.
We’re here for young people, and only young people – ensuring their mental health needs receive the focused attention they deserve.
We provide early intervention and specialised care to young people aged 12-25 years with mental health challenges, helping them get their lives back on track and minimise long-term impacts. This includes services such as case management, medication support, psychological interventions, and family assistance. Our approach provides treatment, care and support for conditions that can’t be adequately addressed in primary care settings.
Primary care includes General Practitioners (GPs) and other community health services, your local headspace and Orygen-led headspace centres in Craigieburn, Glenroy, Melton, Sunshine and Werribee
We work closely with other local health services including, Royal Melbourne Hospital (RMH), Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH), Northern Health, Western Health, Werribee Mercy Health and the Parkville Local Health Services Network
Our approach is built on co-designed principles developed with young people and their families, carers, supporters and kin:
Where we are
While “Parkville” appears in our name, our story extends throughout Melbourne’s north and west, from inner-city neighbourhoods to rapidly growing communities like Werribee, Melton, Craigieburn, Sunshine, and beyond.
PYMHWS operates primary sites out of Sunshine, Footscray, Parkville and Werribee, and Forensic Youth Mental Health Services sites across the north and west of Melbourne.
Our vision
To redefine youth mental health care by setting new standards of excellence in health care, partnerships, innovation and impact.
Our mission
To transform the lives of young people by delivering integrated mental health care that is driven by compassion and united expertise, is responsive to their unique needs and is grounded in research.
Our commitment to child safety
PYMHWS is committed to the health, safety and wellbeing of all children. We play an important role in ensuring the health and wellbeing of children and do not tolerate child abuse. All allegations and safety concerns will be treated very seriously, reported and investigated. PYMHWS is committed to listening respectfully at all times to children and advocating for their right to feel and be safe, valued and protected.
All children and young people who are supported by PYMHWS have the right to feel and be safe. PYMHWS is committed to the principles of cultural safety and inclusion of children from diverse backgrounds and to the safety and inclusion of children with disability, and we recognise that these principles support the safety of all children.
Every person involved at PYMHWS has a responsibility to understand the important and specific role they play individually and collectively to ensure that the wellbeing and safety of all children and young people is at the forefront of all they do. We aim to create a culture of child safety that reduces opportunity for harm and provides our staff with a clear process to follow when child safety concerns are raised.
PYMHWS delivers all care in accordance with the Mental Health and Wellbeing Act 2022 (Vic).
Our values
We are committed to promoting the mental health and wellbeing of young people, their families, carers, supporters and kin, while fostering a culture that embraces our workforce and partners.
Our work is guided by the values of:
Compassion
We prioritise empathy and understanding in every interaction, always engaging with kindness, care, and support.
Respect
We value the diversity, experiences, and perspectives of everyone, and ensure that all voices are heard, acknowledged, and treated with dignity.
Accountability
We take responsibility for our actions, decisions, and outcomes, ensuring that services are delivered safely, transparently, and with a commitment to continuous improvement.
Integrity
We act with honesty and fairness in all we do, ensuring that our commitments and our actions align.
Collaboration
We work together, recognising that partnership and shared expertise are essential to achieving the best outcomes.
Our story
Every day, young people aged 12-25 face unique mental health challenges that require specialised understanding and support. They deserve a mental health system built specifically around their developmental needs, their experiences, and their futures. On 1 July 2025, Victoria makes this a reality with the launch of the Parkville Youth Mental Health and Wellbeing Service (PYMHWS).
PYMHWS implements a key recommendation from the Royal Commission into Victoria’s Mental Health System: creating a youth mental health service stream that provides developmentally appropriate care throughout the critical transition years from adolescence to young adulthood. As Australia’s first standalone public mental health service exclusively for young people aged 12-25, PYMHWS represents both the realisation of this vision and an evolution in how we approach youth mental health – one where young people and their families are championed at every level of the service.
The Royal Commission envisioned integrated, coordinated youth mental health services that eliminate fragmentation and create clear pathways. PYMHWS brings this promise to life through a unique governance structure that puts youth mental health first in every decision.
This focused approach is designed to enable rapid decision-making and innovation. Every policy, resource allocation, and strategic direction serves one purpose: improving mental health outcomes for those aged 12-25. This includes creating the formal partnerships, shared referral pathways, and “no wrong door” entry that the Commission recommended – because finding help shouldn’t be complicated when you’re a young person struggling and needing support.
The PYMHWS Board embodies this commitment, bringing together expertise in youth mental health, governance, and service delivery – including members with lived experience of mental ill-health and as family or careers of those with mental ill-health who will ensure strategies remain grounded in real journeys and real needs. They understand what it’s like to navigate this system, and they’re helping build something better.
PYMHWS’s partnership with Orygen creates a dynamic ecosystem where world-leading research directly informs clinical practice. Free from the competing priorities of a large hospital, studies can be approved faster, participants recruited more efficiently, and findings translated into practice more quickly.
What does this mean for young people? It means they access evidence-based treatments at the cutting edge of international best practice. Their experiences can help shape the next generation of youth mental health innovations. And the gap between research discovery and real-world application shrinks, bringing better care to young people sooner.
This research-practice integration flows directly into how care is delivered, ensuring that every young person benefits from the latest understanding of what works.
When young people and their families walk through PYMHWS’s doors, they will find more than a mental health service – they find an organisation built entirely around youth needs. From governance structures to clinical approaches, from research partnerships to daily operations, every element has been designed with young people at the centre.
This focused approach means innovation while keeping care consistent. Young people won’t have to repeat their story to multiple services anymore. When they need more or less or different support, it happens within the same service, with people who already know them.
This is the promise PYMHWS delivers: a public youth mental health service where focused governance, clinical excellence, research innovation, and lived experience come together in service of one goal – supporting young people to live the lives they want to lead.
The future of youth mental health starts now. And it starts with putting young people first.
Our people and partners
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Our people
Our team of over 500 dedicated professionals forms the backbone of Australia’s first dedicated public youth mental health service. Every team member – from clinicians to administrative staff – shares our commitment to improving mental health outcomes for young people aged 12-25.
Clinical excellence
Our multidisciplinary teams include:
- Psychiatrists specialising in youth mental health
- Clinical psychologists
- Mental health nurses
- Social workers
- Occupational therapists
- Peer support workers
Lived experience at the centre
Youth and family lived experience workers are employed across our service and leadership structure, ensuring that those with firsthand experience guide our approach from the waiting room to the boardroom. We aim to create services that truly respond to the real needs of young people and their families, carers, supporters and kin.
Our community connections and partners
We work closely with other health and social services across Melbourne’s north and west, creating seamless pathways for your mental health care.
Our partnerships extend to:
- Community health services
- GPs
- headspace centres
- Parkville Local Health Service Network
- Educational institutions
- Youth services
- Cultural and community organisations
- Royal Melbourne Hospital (RMH)
- Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH)
- Northern Health
- Western Health
- Werribee Mercy Health
Programs delivered in partnership
Homeless Youth Dual Diagnosis Initiative
The Homeless Youth Dual Diagnosis Initiative (or ‘HYDDI’) aims to reduce the service gap for young people experiencing homelessness, particularly with respect to their mental health and alcohol and other drug use support needs. HYDDI practitioners work in partnership with specialist youth homelessness services. HYDDI practitioners are outposted to youth refuge, where they provide mental health consultation, training and system navigation for the youth homelessness workforce, and assessment, direct support and referral for young people. You can contact the HYDDI program via our Parkville site 9966 9100.
Refugee Access Service
The Refugee Access Service aims to provide a timely, trauma-informed and culturally tailored mental health triage and assessment response for newly-arrived refugee children and young people. The Refugee Access Service works in partnership with, and receives referrals from settlement services, Foundation House, English Language Schools and immigrant health services. You can contact the Refugee Access Service via our Parkville site 9966 9100.
Forensic Youth Mental Health Service (FYMHS)
FYMHS is delivered in partnership with the Department of Justice & Community Safety (DJCS), Justice Health (JH) and the Department of Families, Fairness and Housing (DFFH).
FYMHS provide specialist mental health care within Victoria’s youth justice custodial settings, as well as some Children’s Courts and to the North and West community Youth Justice regions.
Custodial FYMHS:
How to refer to the Custodial FYMHS team: Referrals to the Custodial FYMHS team come via the primary health team within the youth justice precinct.
Community FYMHS:
One of the teams within the Community FYMHS team is the Youth Forensic Assessment and Consultation Service (YFACS). YFACS is a specialist forensic consultation service, providing primary and secondary forensic consultation, and recommendations to clients and case managers from CYMHS/CAMHS services regarding forensic risk and safety planning.
How to refer to the YFACS team: Please call our Parkville site 9966 9100
Community Development Team
The Community Development team provides a range of community engagement activities, including mental health training, and secondary consultation. You can contact the Community Development team via our Parkville site 9966 9100.
Orygen Clinical Training
This team provides specialist training for Victoria’s youth mental health workforce. You can contact Orygen Clinical Training via our Parkville site 9966 9100.
