Author Archives: mmckenz11

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About mmckenz11

IT Officer for London School of Osteopathy and a Carer representative for Maudsley. As you can see, I have many interests shown off my blog. I hope to keep it updated with posts and more things to come soon.

Experiencing mental health caregiving – Carer peer support

Welcome back to a summary of chapter 3 of my book “Experiencing mental health caregiving”

This blog focuses on my 2nd book – Experiencing mental health caregiving. The book helps raise awareness of unpaid carers providing care to someone close suffering mental illness. The book highlights the experiences of providing unpaid caring.

For Chapter 3 – “Carer befriending and peer support” I asked carers several questions, but this video will look at the first question that being “What does carer peer support mean to you?

The reason I asked such a question was down to how can carers relate to others when caring can be a private and personal experience. Do carers know they can get support from others to reduce stigma and increase carer knowledge?

Just like the videos I have done on my 2nd book, I will sum up a few responses from those regarding “Carer Befriending and peer support”.

To check out the video summary see link below

So going back to my book, chapter 3 got responses regarding carer peer support, you can see the responses below.

One carer Jacqui Darlington responded

“A carer peer is someone who can offer emotional and practical support to another carer by using their own lived experiences which may enable them to overcome barriers, challenges and fears to achieve whatever it is they may need. They may also be known as Experts by Experience .”

I not only asked knowledgeable carers, but also engaged with mental health trusts.

Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust rep responded

“We train people up as peer support workers or carer peer support workers. We are now employing them in the jobs at the NHS trust. I think as a carer peer support worker, the difference between that and pure peer support worker is that the carer peer has lived experience in caring. .”

One last point – Another carer responded

“To me, carer peer means supporting a carer who may be struggling with the sometimes overwhelming difficulties experienced when caring for a loved one with mental health issues. Being there for that carer, sharing personal experiences and showing an understanding of what they are going through”

I asked 8 other questions for Chapter 3,

  • Have you experienced carer befriending and what did it feel like?
  • Where should carer peer support be located?
  • Do you think there is enough education on carer peer support?
  • Would you befriend other carers?
  • Is there a line or boundary to carer peer support?
  • Is there a difference between carer peer support and service user peers?
  • Why is carer peer support lagging behind?

The responses I will cover in a later video, but to sum up What does carer peer support mean to you?

I noticed that lived experience was critical to becoming a peer carer. To share your understanding and knowledge of the caring role and help those new to caring is vital in forming a connection.

if you are interested about mental health carers, you can buy my book on the link below

Bromley, Greenwich, Bexley & Lewisham Ethnic Carer Forum March 2022

Welcome to the March 2022 update of my Ethnic mental health carers forum. The forum is aimed at those from a diverse ethnic background who care for someone suffering serious mental illness. The forum also covers areas under South London & Maudsley NHS trust and also Oxleas NHS foundation trust, but forum does allow ethnic carers to attend from other service areas. Just to note, I am also the chair of Carers UK Ethnic or BAME advisory group.

Speakers for my March 2022 forum where

  • Abigail Babatunde – Research Associate on the Advance Statements Project (AdStAC)
  • Karen Edmunds – Head of Equality and Human Rights presenting on Oxleas Equalities projects

Karen Edmund presents on Equalities updates at Oxleas NHS services

Karen felt that after the introductions of members of the BAME group, that Oxleas are in the same place as some other NHS trusts are in terms of carer involvement, but she admitted there is more work to do. Karen talked about how they are developing what’s called an “Involvement hub”, which is been led by Jacqueline, who’s Oxleas NHS assistant director of involvement with her team.

Karen feels there has been reasonable amount of service user involvement, where people work with experienced practitioners, but when it comes to carers and community organisations, there is a lot of work to do and they haven’t been quite maybe quite as good as some other NHS Trusts out there.

Karen spoke on the following topics on what Oxleas is working on regarding equalities.

Workforce Equality:

  • Workforce Race Equality Standard (WRES) -reporting and annual action plan
  • Workforce Disability Equality Standard (WDES) – reporting and annual action plan
  • Supporting our five staff networks (BAMEx, Disability, LGBTQ+, Mental Health, Women)
  • Building a Fairer Oxleas (BAFO)
  • Policy development
  • Enquiries related to workforce equality

Service User/Patient and Carer Equality

  • Accessible Information Standard (AIS)
  • Policy development
  • Patient complaints related to equality issues
  • Manage the Interpreting contract
  • Manage our multifaith chaplain + Chaplaincy contract with Lewisham and Greenwich Trust
  • Service User Inequalities Group (new)
  • Patient and Carer Race Equality Framework (new)

Staff and patients / service users / carers

  • Equality Delivery System 2 (EDS2) annual report
  • Public Sector Equality Duty
  • Equality and Human Rights Policy, Equality and Diversity training
  • Freedom of Information requests related to equality

Lastly to enable Oxleas to become an early adopter of the Patient and Carer Race Equality Framework (SLaM have been involved in the pilot phase)

Karen then spoke about building a Fairer Oxleas Delivered actions Year 1

Improving cultural competency:

  • Cultural intelligence and inclusive leadership training for the Executive team and 50 senior managers
  • Inclusive leadership workshops open to all managers
  • Comfortable talking about race workshops open to all managers
  • Living our values training for managers to deliver a values session with their team
  • ‘In Each Other’s Shoes’ film about microaggressions, plus a guide on microaggressions
  • Team talks to show ‘In Each Other’s Shoes’ and discuss it
  • Building a Fairer Oxleas section on the Ox (our intranet)
  • Race Resource pack with articles, short films, and useful links to external resources

The outcome will look to improve all experiences of their Black, Asian and minority ethnic staff, which will help improve the experience of Black, Asian and minority ethnic service users and carers

Karen explained The NHS Race and Health Observatory review February 2022 found that:

Ethnic minority groups experienced clear inequalities in access to Improving Access to Psychological Therapies IAPTs; overall, ethnic minority groups were less likely to refer themselves to IAPT and less likely to be referred by their GPs, compared with White British people.

Evidence was identified for inequalities in the receipt of cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) with ethnic minority people with psychosis less likely to be referred for CBT, and less likely to attend as many sessions as their White counterparts

The review provided strong evidence of clear, very large and persisting ethnic inequalities in compulsory admission to psychiatric wards, particularly affecting Black groups, but also Mixed Black & White groups and South Asian groups.

There was also evidence of harsher treatment for Black groups in inpatients wards, e.g., more likely to be restrained in the prone position or put into seclusion.

More bad news was on how black children were treated in the NHS

Parents reported their children facing the same barriers to accessing services as reported for adult mental health services. Two studies of young Black men showed that they were deterred from seeking help by their knowledge of injustices in mental health services relating to Black Caribbean and Black African populations. Two large national studies found that ethnic minority children were more likely to be referred to CAMHS via social services, education or criminal justice pathways. This was particularly stark for Black children who were 10 times more likely to be referred to CAMHS via social services (rather than through the GP) relative to White British children.

Karen then talked about Oxleas new Service User Inequalities Group

She then moved to its aims which was to explain that it will help deliver Oxleas’s strategy on service user access and inequalities

This will be done by looking at their data on the ethnicity, disability, gender identity, religion, and sexual orientation of patients compared to the local population which will lead to clear actions to tackle inequity of access, experience and outcomes.

Karen the talked about how Supporting Oxleas staff to deliver inclusive care on Proposed actions to tackle inequalities

This is on how all services have a generic email for patient contact to provide an alternative to phone contact Clear information in a range of formats in plain language on what each service provides, referral criteria, and how to get access Disability access guides to key sites available on public website.

Oxleas NHS will be an early adopter of the Patient and Carer Race Equality Framework Engagement with local communities and use this feedback to target service development where it’s needed most Scope care pathways where we can pilot inclusive assessments, factoring culture, ethnicity, disability, sexual orientation and gender identity Patient experience data by protected characteristics will be routinely produced, analysed and reviewed by services to identify differences of experience and then plan actions to address these.

Questions from Carer members

  • You shown what Oxleas are doing for CAMHS and Adult service, but what about older Adults?
  • Its an interesting and important presentation, but I am wondering why a white woman is presenting on equalities regarding disadvantages of black people, does Oxleas employ representing the communities it serves?
  • With the impact of COVID on ethnic communities, what does Oxleas have in place to reduce the impact?
  • I am interested in how Oxleas are going to work with the Patient Carer Race Equalities Framework, arent Oxleas service area’s mainly white?
  • Lastly a question from myself is I do not see hardly any ethnic patient/carer grassroot groups that Oxleas is able to engage with. How will ethnic patient and carer groups be empowered so they SEEK engagement and hold Oxleas accountable on services to ethnic communities?

Abigail presents on the Advance Statements Project (AdStAC)

Abigail spoke on how South London & Maudsley are working to promote advance statements for Black and African, Caribbean people. This is because of the high detention rates and especially with black people being more likely to be detained under the Mental Health Act.

It is important to promote why having to work with staff service users, and carers and supporters to understand how to get advanced choice documents or advanced statements can work for black people.

Carer Poem : The Journey by Matthew McKenzie

Welcome everyone especially unpaid carers. I am preparing a lot of things for Carers Week 2022. It looks to be an exciting set of activities for carers and those that work with them across the UK.

I am also been busy working on my new book for this year. It is a poetry book on the experiences of providing care to those suffering mental illness. This is from the perspective of an unpaid carer.

Here is one of my latest videos on the Poem “The Journey” and also a reflection of that poem.

The poem is from a book I am working on is called “The Poetry book of mental health caring” as you can see from the cover below

The Poetry book of Mental Health Caring

I am hoping to release the book on Amazon this year, perhaps around the Autumn, but it is not just a book containing poems. The book will ask readers to reflect regarding the nature of the poem. One of the NHS trust’s I talked to felt it could be useful for training, even though a lot of focus is on unpaid carers to reflect on the nature of the poem and how it could help them.

Anyway, I am hoping to blog more of my poems soon.

May Carer News Updates 2022

The latest edition of my online carer, mental health and ethnic mental health news is out for May.

Click below to view latest carer news for May

May 2022 Carer News

For the May edition we have

Lewisham Council Unpaid Carers Pre-Consultation – Video from Lewisham council showing consultation with carers and voluntary groups on what will help carers.

The Health and Care Act: six key questions – The Kings Fund answers 6 key questions on the Health and Care act, which should be vital reading for unpaid carers and those who engage with them.

NHS England: Dementia – Department of Health and Social Care written question – Response from the government regarding NHS progress for dementia care. Keep an eye for other written questions from the online newsletter.

Write to your MP this Carers Week calling for a Recovery and Respite Plan for unpaid carers – Excellent template for carers to write to their MP.

Mental Health Services: Ethnic Groups – Department of Health and Social Care written question – Government response to the Patient Carer Race Equality Framework.

SIGN UP TO NEWS SITE HERE

Bromley, Greenwich, Bexley & Lewisham Ethnic Carer Forum February 2022

Welcome to a brief update of my february ethnic mental health carer forum. As usual the forum is an engagement platform for those caring for someone suffering mental illness from an ethnic background. I run the forum via zoom with the support of several mental health trusts.

Speakers at my carer forum for February were

  • Lisa Fannon the Public Health Training and Development Manager for Lewisham updating on Health inequalities
  • Ellie Wharton Senior Project Manager for Health Innovation Network
  • Engagement from the Police on mental health
  • Lisa Fannon presents on health inequalities project

Lisa wanted to update us on the health inequalities project. Since last month there was a discussion with KINARA who attended and talked about the work that they are undertaking in the community, specifically around the Birmingham and Lewisham health inequalities review that is being undertaken with the African and Caribbean communities.

That work has now been concluded and she has received a report. Lisa hopes that they will be able to launch all of that information with an event that’s taking place soon. Lisa reminded that some of us may have received the invite to that event already, but she wanted to ensure that as a community group that we were aware what is happening.

The event will be overseen and organised by Public Health Lewisham. They will also plan to have a additional event following the one just mentioned and it will specifically be for community members. This will be essentially a second in series of events around health inequalities where they are aiming to bring together community groups, and members of the health and social care and health and social care leaders talk about health inequalities. Lisa wants this to be done in partnership with the health and well-being to address health inequalities in Lewisham, and bring together everybody to discuss the situation.

There of course will be opportunities to look at some of the achievements of this work, but also to discuss further action on what needs to be done to tackle health inequalities. Lisa mentioned they will look at what kind of plans that they are hoping to undertake across this year and what future needs is happening at the event.

The event will run in the evening at a Community Centre, where she has sent in advance of this meeting, information about the event to Matthew.

  • Ellie Wharton presents on the Health Innovation Network

Ellie wanted to tell us about the mental health patient safety network event, which is part of their mental health safety improvement programme. Ellie apologised for the acronyms flying around on the programme, but thanked us for inviting her to join and speak at our ethnic carer group.

Ellie agreed with some members that health inequalities is such an important topic, which is why they have chosen it for their second event to focus for the safety network. Ellie talked about what the Health Innovation Network is, which is an Academic Health Science Network (AHSN) for south London, one of 15 AHSNs across England.

The AHSN exist to speed up the best in health and care. They have been commissioned by NHS England and Improvement to focus on Mental Health Safety. Which involves developing a Safety network and supporting quality improvement work in certain areas (such as restrictive practice).

Their principles are central to how the programme runs:
• co-design with people with lived experience
• Creating shared learning, connection and Joy
• Foundations of systematic QI
• Engaging with inequalities where they exist
• Working with their foundations and all the good things that already exist

Ellie then pointed out a member of my ethnic carer forum and stated one of the members was involved in the event. This is when the carer member spoke on her section regarding health inequalities and carers.

Ellie then talked about the mental health safety network.

The network is an interactive designed to bring together individuals across the system with the shared goal of improving mental health safety it is co-hosted by the HIN and the 3 south London Mental Health Trusts (South London & Maudsley NHS Trust, Oxleas NHS Trust and South West London & St George NHS Trust). It’s purpose is to create value through sharing learning, creating connections and building energy and capability in safety improvement

The event welcomes people who share the MH safety network’s goals of improving mental health safety. Registration is open to people with lived experience of mental health services, including carers, clinical and managerial staff from NHS, independent and private health and social care providers, commissioning leads, local authorities, voluntary sector partners, police, emergency services and other system partners.

Ellie then talked to us about the agenda of the event.

  • Mental health Police engagement from South London

The forum gets engagement from the police every now and then. This is mostly because the police have an interest in mind while helping those in a crisis, they want to connect and reassure carers. The police talked about what sites they cover this being Sutton, Croydon and Bromley although its quite a small team.

Their main sort of role and objectives is being a direct liaison with the NHS and mental health trusts. There are other objectives dealing with assaults against NHS, racial assaults against NHS staff where the perpetrators is having mental health issue.

The police then talked about section 136 and how they have been dealing with a lot of escalations. The police think the section is being overused. They think there’s things that they can do as a team to prevent that. There was also some talk about what they can do to help with people out in the streets dealing directly with mental health issues.

The police try and get out and about to the hospitals as well. They have got a police liaison officer that works at the hospital and who deals with crime at other Hospitals.

In a nutshell the police work directly with mental health patients once they were coming into contact with police.

The importance of carers week 2022

Welcome everyone, especially unpaid fellow carers who are caring for someone.

My name is Matthew McKenzie, carer, author of a Caring Mind and Experiences of Mental health caregiving. I also run many carer peer groups and forums aimed at those providing support to someone suffering mental illness. Plus I am the chair of Carers UK ethnic carers advisory group and the National Triangle of care group regarding principles of carer engagement.

I am here to blog about carers week. For this year, it will be carers week 2022. I have been a long supporter of raising that much needed awareness of carers week not only to those who provide health and social care services to unpaid carers, but raising awareness of caring to the public and even carers themselves, not every knows or understands they are caring.

To watch the video, please play the video below.

  • So what is carers week all about?

Carers Week is an annual campaign to raise awareness of caring, highlight the challenges unpaid carers face and recognise the contribution they make to families and communities throughout the UK. It also helps people who don’t think of themselves as having caring responsibilities to identify as carers and access much-needed support.

Organisations that support carers week are too numerous to mention, but the main ones are listed below

  • AgeUK
  • Carers Trust
  • Carers UK
  • Motor Neurone Disease Association
  • Oxfam
  • Rethink Mental Illness
  • The Lewy Body Society
  • So why do I feel Carers Week is so important this year?

Well there are several reasons.

The first is that there are many policies and laws being revamped and changed, this includes the Mental Health Act, The health & Social care Bill, Mental capacity Act and many more. We must raise the awareness that these changes do not exclude carers and their importance.

The other reasons are due to the high cost of living, unpaid care by its very definition IS unpaid, the vulnerable took a knock during the COVID-19 crisis and yet again the vulnerable will take a hit again. Providing support and care in the community should be praised by society and yet many think people should just “Get on with it”.

There are many other reasons, but the video would take so long. Unpaid caring carries stigma, not many would jump to the front of the line and say they are caring for someone suffering psychosis or self harm, because still in society people will be riddiculed. The other side of the coin is that some carers out there do not want the label, but the risk is they might lose out on support. Carers week gives that much needed awareness to say caring should be valued.

Lastly did I mention I am a poet? I am supporting Carers Week 2022 by doing a share and learn session at Carers UK. If you are a carer and want to hear more about my poety, mental health or awareness of ethnic / BAME carers. Please see the link below

https://www.carersuk.org/help-and-advice/get-support/share-and-learn-online-sessions

SW London MH Carer Forum February 2022

Welcome to a brief update of my South West London carers peer group. The reason this update is brief is because we had no speakers planned to attend and sometimes carer members just update on their situation.

A quick reminder is this group is aimed at those who are caring for someone with serious mental illness, they could be using the services of the local mental health trust South West London & St Georges or perhaps the person they are caring for is not in recipt of services. The carer group is a peer, engagement, networking and empowerment group covering the 5 boroughs SWLSTG covers (Richmond, Wandsworth, Merton, Kingston & Sutton).

For february we had a very good turn out and some new members. Most of the discussion was on sharing knowledge to those new to caring or those who were not sure what support they could get.

As usual I wont report anything confidential between members, only when speakers talk about issues that those unable to attend can catch up on.

Fast forward to May and engagement has been increasing between my groups and engagement from NHS England & Improvement and the local Healthwatches. Even if members struggle to feedback, they can at least understand what are the important issues of the day.

Mental Health poem by Matthew McKenzie

Welcome to my latest blog post. It has been a while since I have uploaded a poem. I have written close to 65 poems on the carer experience since the start of this year. Slowly a fair number of poems will be uploaded to my YouTube Playlist. The poems will play by themselves.

Plus I have added some podcasts of my poems

Carer Poetry Series

My latest poem is called “Confusion”

This poem is quite dark, but tells an often all too familiar story where the carer is trying to care for someone who has relapsed into mental illness. There are no beds or resources for the person who is very sick and thus the carer is confused on what to do. She will stick it out and try and cope as she watches her ‘loved one’ descend into madness.

Confusion by Matthew McKenzie

I sit and wait wondering what is next
Too scared to look at whats before me
The phone sits on the table, i am not sure who to call
I just dont know…I have tried before

The sounds…so distressing, so much is on me
but time is going so slow as my mind torments me
I look at him as his eyes look straight past
My heart sinks as my mind is harassed

Minute by minute..hour by hour
Not a word heard or a form of contact
I sit and wait wondering whats next
confusion takes me and I cannot find the solution.

Bromley, Greenwich, Bexley & Lewisham Ethnic Carer Forum January 2022

Welcome to the first ethnic carer forum of the month. My carer forum has expanded to cover south London with support from Oxleas NHS trust and South London & Maudsley NHS trust. A quick comment about the forum is that it bring together families and unpaid carers looking someone suffering mental illness. We seek engagement, information and a way to be involved or learn the challenges of mental health care.

For January 2022 speakers we had the following speakers.

  • Lisa Fannon, Barabra grey – Public Health Training and Development Manager
  • Natalie creary – Black Thrive Lambeth – Research regarding young people
  • Jackie Peat -​ Lewisham Diversity and Equality Lead
  • Sheena Wedderman – Culturally Diverse Communities Project Manager
  • Lisa Fannon presents on BLACHIR

Just to note BLACHIR stands for Birmingham and Lewisham African & Caribbean Health Inequalities Review

Lisa updated us on how Lewisham and Birmingham City Council are working across both Lewisham and Birmingham to focus on African and Caribbean health inequalities. Both of areas had worked previously looking at health inequalities across the board. One of the projects was on the childhood obesity program, this was during pandemic at the time, and around November, given the impact of the pandemic.

What was interesting was the impact of the lockdown and how things started to be immersed for the vast community. The group came together to look at focusing on how they could collect knowledge to support looking at how health inequalities had been an issue. Even though health inequalities have existed for decades, the project looked at trying to bring them to the forefront, which would lead to a report that could be shared nationally.

As part of that process, Lisa explained it was important to bring that information from a lived experience process within the community. This would also include the wealth of knowledge from academics across the country. The knowledge would be on the experience specifically on health inequalities.

Lisa explained that they are now working in different phases for their research, to promote and focus on information regarding health inequalities for black communities. This required a rigorous process in 2020. Where Lisa actually came to the SL&M board to talk about how they were recruiting people to take part in this process. So basically, they recruited a range of academics, from black communities who were working specifically on health inequalities.

Lisa mentioned they also put a call out to community members in Birmingham, asking them to come forward on a voluntary basis, in order to provide their experience on a range of things that they felt were were important to focus on.

What is BLACHIR?

Click Website link to visit for more info

Barbara Grey presents on KINARAA

Next it was Barbara Grey who presented some information about KINARAA and its aim is to grow the black third sector, and diversify the marketplace and ultimately improve access and well being of black, African and Caribbean people. It’s very specific, because that’s where the need is, and its focus. This is with the ethos is around collaboration.

This is where it brings together black led organizations to do what only they can do. During the first lockdown the determination showed what can happen when people come together. Another person at the forum involved in KINARAA explained that it’s just like magic to watch in terms of seeing how everybody comes together. They know what the issues are, they bring their expertise, they know exactly what the solutions are. In the end it’s a bit like a jigsaw puzzle. People just got this amazing work that goes on, which can lead to a strategic voice.

Click website link to find out more about KINARAA

Barbara Grey mentioned that she has worked with many people out there in the community. She felt that it’s really good to see because there are other types of initiatives including the “Patient Carer Race Equality Framework”. There needs to be a focus on black leadership on health inequalities and how communities can work together.

As a result of that they have done there are now four organizations who have done amazing engagement where they’ve done focus groups, one to one interviews, and there are also surveys that just gone live. At the time of the forum there are over 70 people have responded to the survey that went live. The responses are covering the borough quite well in terms of where you’d expect to see African and Caribbean people. So it just goes to show that if you want to reach people, plus if you’re working with people who’ve got the relationships where you’ve got the expertise, and you just bring it all together in the right way. It will just happen. And the results that you will get back is pretty outstanding.

Stakeholder feedback on partnership

A stakeholder involved in the KINARAA project responded that its all about a partnership and collaboration with organization. For them, it was actually driving hard at the work, time was a challenge because it was short, but it did not put them off because they were excited to be involved on this kind of work.

This was something special to them because for them they are a small organization, they are looking at the pathway to raise their voice, because in the end it is them who are the first point of accessing people to access the services.

So the process that has been undertaken, as part of that review is that as the review team, those colleagues involved in Birmingham and themselves will pull together evidence, work with researchers and commissioned researchers to come together and give reports on specific areas of health inequalities. They will share that information with academic board members who are around 15 academic board members that are also taking part in a review. They will then look at the evidence as they come to a meeting, or provide their information on how they feel that these health inequalities are impacting.

Natalie Creary presents on Black Thrive Lambeth

Natalie explained that as an organization called “Black thrive”, their work sort of started in the London Borough of Lambeth. Following a commission from the black health and wellbeing commission, and that was undertaken with other communities and other stakeholders. They came up with 40 recommendations to narrow the inequalities gap for black people. This led to Black Thrive being born. It was established to kind of be an independent entity that holds the system to account to be able to move forward on the health agenda of black communities.

Natalie continue that they looked at addressing mental health and equality, thinking about the social determinants of health. Natalie mentioned that they have been an independent entity for about many months now. So they are actually officially black led organization. They are currently working with many partners to explore how we can influence the social emotional wellbeing offer for black children and young people.

It was mentioned that they actually got a project currently where children in need, will co-design the criteria for a fund, which will then fund primarily black led interventions to address the mental health and well being needs for for black people

Sheena Wedderman on her new role in Bromley Lewisham & Greenwich Mind

Sheen’s explained her job role as the culturally diverse communities project manager. The role came around from a piece of research in relation to the young people of color, and diverse communities going in and out of hospitals. What was found was people from diverse communities that are entering mental health settings usually experience crisis levels that rise quite quickly. Such people are sectioned in secure wards, being medicated and often staying far too long on those inpatient wards. Then they end up coming back into the community with a really negative experience of mental health services. This in turn leads to experiencing even more mental health challenges, where they would re-enter the system at crisis level, go back into hospital, be medicated and stay too long, then coming out and not trusting the system and not getting the service that they actually deserved needed.

Sheena then talked about her focus on information that were born out of that piece of research. The what the info aims to do is to look at what the barriers ethnic people are experience, why are people waiting until they get to crisis levels to access services, but more importantly, how we can prevent them from getting on the carousel of going in and out of hospital; being medicated and coming back out in order to going back in.

She felt people need to be supported by the communities that they live in, in order to improve their mental health. So the new project basically decided how they were going to get some funding and look at how they could support people in their local community.

Bromley, Lewisham & Greenwich Mind are looking at putting out to tender for more community care support workers, who are going to be based in and around community groups. They will provide a service that identifies who in the community needs that support. This is so if at any point there is an issue with their mental health, then these organizations or these local organizations will support the people accessing those mental health services

Jackie Peat presents on her role as Lewisham Diversity and Equality Lead for SLaM

Jackie who is now SL&M’s (Lewisham) diversity and equality lead, was brought into this role 2021. This was to come up with recommendations regarding staff concerns over equality where support came from the CQC, NHS England, the board of directors for slam.

The problems were a lack of opportunities for any black staff to move forward to go up the ladder, or actually sit on the boards. Jackie felt it was a shame that she had to go through some challenges, even though she just wanted to be heard. Eventually a subgroup was formed in January 2021, which led to a subgroup being formed, which she co-chaired at the time. The sub-group led to recommendations where many items need to be met.

Basically ethnic staff just wanted a safe space to speak. Presently there has been a lot of promotion are the trust are doing to look after our black staff etc etc. Jackie still feels there are many challenges to work through, but there are many positives.

Exploring the barriers and facilitators to recovery for South Asian service users 

Nafisah Nabi a PhD student at the University of Mancheste is working on a PhD research project focuses on exploring the barriers and facilitators to recovery for South Asian service users within IAPT services. Nafisah is looking to recruit a Patient and Public Involvement Group who can offer feedback on research plans and study materials.

Please see the poster below. You can contact Nalisah at nafisah.nabi@postgrad.manchester.ac.uk