Welcome to the first SW London Mental Health carers forum for the year 2024. This group is aimed at those caring for someone with mental ill health within SW London. The group aligns itself with the same areas the mental health trust South West London & St George’s covers.

Our members are from the boroughs of Merton, Sutton, Kingston, Richmond and Wandsworth. The carers forum is co-facilitated by Ava who is also a carer. Ava focuses on the carer peer aspect in the group. She is also a strong member of the Kingston Carers Network and on involvement at SWLSTG.

The speaker requested by the SW London MH carers group was Stamatia Filippou. Stamatia is the Wellbeing Practitioner of the Wellbeing Team, NHS Merton Talking Therapies. She is based at SWLSTG. Members wanted to hear what services were provided by Merton Uplift.

Merton Uplift Presentation

Stamatia talked about the following.

On how NHS Merton Talking Therapies is a free service for anyone in Merton who has a mental health or wellbeing need, whether this is due to emotional difficulties or life stressors (low mood, feeling stressed or worried, stressful family situations, financial worries, parents who are worried about their children or feeling overwhelmed, life changing events).
The service is accessible to anyone living in the borough of Merton or registered with a Merton GP who are 18 years and over.

Stamatia also mentioned that they are an integrated service which consists of the following teams; Talking Therapies: Offering a range of psychological therapies, CBT (cognitive-behavioural therapy), IPT (interpersonal therapy), EMDR (eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing), Mindfulness based therapies, online, over the phone or face-to-face, self-guided, in groups or one-to-one.

There is also support for Wellbeing, where this helps individuals connect and access activities and resources to meet their physical, social and emotional needs. Their outreach work focuses on engaging with individuals who have historically not fully accessed talking therapies. Merton Uplift run a variety of wellbeing workshops e.g., Coping with Stress, Food and Mood, Living Well with Chronic Pain, Managing Anger, Managing Sleep, Self-care and Relaxation, Understanding Anxiety, Reaching your potential, Work, stress and burnout plus Wellbeing for carers.

After the presentation, there was a Q & A session where carers can feedback or query what was on offer.

For Talking Therapies referrals:
Phone: 020 3513 5888
Referral Email: mertonupliftreferrals@swlstg.nhs.uk
Via the website: Referral Form (mayden.co.uk)
The service’s admin team will register your referral and book you in for an assessment.

For Wellbeing workshop referrals:
Wellbeing Email: MertonWellbeing@swlstg.nhs.uk
Book directly on Eventbrite: https://mertonuplift.eventbrite.co.uk