Access to mental health care for East Asian immigrant youth

East Asian immigrant youth are a large and growing population in Europe. As young people who are expected to successfully navigate and have fully adapted to living in the country of residence, East Asian immigrant youth face many challenges which affect their mental health. Yet, despite the numerous studies which show the high prevalence of mental health problems and the underutilization of mainstream mental healthcare services by East Asian immigrant youth living in the west, few studies have been conducted on the help-seeking behaviour and use of mental health services by East Asian immigrant youth in Europe. This study aims to find the factors which impact help-seeking behaviours and utilization of mental health care (MHC) in the Netherlands. Information was gathered through semi-structured, in-depth interview with 6 East Asian participants. 4 participants were East Asian immigrant youth who have experience in utilizing or is currently utilizing the MHC in the Netherlands. 2 participants are professionals who currently work in the mental healthcare sector and identify as East Asian. Findings showed that help-seeking behaviour and utilization of MHC were affected by familial and cultural factors, stigma, previous exposure and experience to MHC, inadequate knowledge of mental health and MHC, affordability, and language barriers. The study was exploratory and due to the limited number of participants, was not able to examine other variations of sources of stress and factors to underutilization of MHC. The provision of relevant information on mental health and MHC for East Asian immigrant youth and the communities which they frequently interact with, would be beneficial to increase awareness and improve access. Understanding East Asian culture for practitioners in the mental healthcare sector would be important to increase access and provide culturally sensitive, quality services.