Covid-19 vaccine – Its safe and necessary

Welcome to my latest blog post by unpaid carer Matthew Mckenzie from South London. I thought to do a quick blog and do my bit regarding COVID-19 Vaccines and the importance of getting the vaccine when it is offered to you.

As you probably already know, just by looking at my photo. I am a black person. It was only in 2019 that health services were put under immense pressure due to the impact of the virus. Not just the health services, but social care, the economy….come to think about it practically everything. Up until now many unfortunately people have been taken from us because of this terrible virus. The old and young, black or white and rich or poor. No one is truely safe, especially those who high risk COVID infection jobs or those from poorer backgrounds. Those from BAME groups have a higher risk of catching the infection and are still suffering the worst outcomes. It does not help that the history of health and social care has been at odds with those from a BAME background.

Fast forward to now there has been many changes and developments. We in the UK are lucky to have access to COVID-19 Vaccines and it was not long before I was offered mine. As a carer and a black person, I was still in two minds about getting the jab.

I must admit I am in many whatsapp groups, plus facebook groups and so on. I often received emails warning about the vaccine and how black people were being tested for eradication, or how my hair would fall out (well I don’t have that much left anyway). Most people I came into contact with discussed the importance of having the Vaccine, while others did not want anything to do with it. Looking back on what we all have been through in 2020 certainly made up my mind. I have lost too many people to the virus and when I was offered the vaccine, I took it.

The day of vaccine jab, I felt a little nervous, I was not sure what to expect or if I would get an unfriendly service. I admit it was so easy to book the appointment online and the location of the vaccine centre was very easy to get to.

I was greeted by friendly staff at the GP surgery who asked appropriate questions before I was due for the vaccine. It was not a long wait and every one was friendly. I filled out a form on my health backgroud, which was also very fast and waited for my turn.

I did not see anyone being dragged into a room and given the shot, people could change their mind anytime and to be honest every one was calm and quite. As soon as I was in the nurses treatment area, the jab was so quick that I hardly noticed it. There still some worry about side effects, but its been 2 days now and apart from a sort arm I have had no side effects at all.

I felt that after all the worry, the COVID-19 vaccine is completely safe and we as black people need all the defense we can get from the virus. There is no conspiracy to wipe out the black race or put microchips in them. We won’t be made infertile, because there certainly is no serious data on clinical trials pointing to this.

It still is important to wear a mask, because no vaccine is 100% effective and so it is important to practice social distancing. I urge those from a BAME background to take the vaccine because we have suffered enough not just from the virus but the difficult roles that those from a BAME background have to do be it in the NHS or social care. I certainly urge carers also to take the vaccine because if you are caring for someone vulnerable and you catch the virus then you put the person you care for at greater risk.

We all must do our bit and protect ourselves, our community and our loved ones. The virus does not really care if your black or white, rich or poor. The virus’s job is to infect you and you have to roll that dice to hope it won’t kill you or spread to those you are trying to protect.

Do yourself a favour and take the jab.

Joint Southwark & Lambeth MH Carers forum January 2021

Welcome to the January Southwark & Lambeth joint Mental Health carer forum. The forum is aimed at carers who are caring for someone with mental illness, but they want to understand what mental health services are planning and also what carers can get access to.

For the speakers for this forum, were as follows.

Josh Simpkins – Lambeth Carers

David Meyrick – SLaM Southwark inpatient ward carer lead – Triangle of Care

Karen Persaud – Carer rep for the Royal College of Psychiatrists

Yasmin from Lambeth Black Thrive

Continue reading →

Lewisham BAME MH Carer Forum January 2021

Welcome to the first January Lewisham BAME carer forum for 2021. The BAME carer forum is one of the 6 carer forums I run once a month. The carer forum runs online to adhere to covid-19 restrictions and allows members to attend a lot more easily.

The BAME Mental Health carer forum is aimed at BAME carers who are caring for someone with a mental illness, especially for someone using the services of South London & Maudsley, although I am not super strict who attends the forum since carers from other forums and boroughs often attend.

On the January agenda were the following.

  • NHS England presenting on their National Patient Carer Race Equality Framework (PCREF)
  • SLaM presenting on their Local drives for PCREF
  • SLaM older adults diversity drive

We were joined by Staff from Oxleas as well as Manchester NHS Trust who are also seeking to engage and improve services for the BAME community.

Continue reading →

The Fircroft Trust urgent appeal

The Fircroft Trust are devastated to have been informed by RBK, without consultation or notice, to vacate our beloved Mental Health Resource Centre on Ditton Road.

The Fircroft Trust has leased this building for over 40 years and provide a haven for over 75 people who have varying degrees of mental health challenges. At a time when there is a national crisis in mental health, withdrawing this essential support system, which has not only been shown to improve quality of life for the individuals who accessed it, but also reduce hospital admissions and suicide rates, has been devastating for our local community.

The Fircroft Trust has worked hard to minimise the impact of the pandemic on the people who rely on their service and have continued to support the community by maintaining daily contact with their most vulnerable service-users, either via telephone, outside group activities or ‘COVID-friendly’ garden work and meet-ups. However, the impact of the pandemic has meant The Fircroft Trust faced increasing demands for their service from vulnerable members of our community. This is something The Fircroft Trust can’t ignore and they urgently need your help.

How you can help

Services needed by our community:

The Fircroft Trust are urgently seeking new premises in the Chessington, Surbiton or Tolworth area that would be suitable for us to resume the face-to-face support services that is so missed by our service users.

If you can help, or know of a local building, please contact Kay Harris on the details below.  Please share this with your network and help us to continue supporting the people in our community who need us most.

The Fircroft Trust

Tel:         07885 771571

Email:     office@thefircrofttrust.org

http://www.thefircrofttrust.org

Lewisham Mental Health Carers forum January 2021

Welcome to the first update of the first carer forum for January. These carer forums are aimed at those caring for someone with mental illness. The forums provided engagement from mental health services to educate and involve carers regarding services provided.

Carers can also network together and slowly build up empowerment. For the month of January we had Lewisham health commissioner Natalie Sutherland talk about the following.

  • Her role at the Clinical Commissioning Group
  • Why the CCGs merged
  • Their focus on mental health
  • Pressures on the health system due to corona virus
  • Initiatives for families and carers.

Also in attendance were carer members from Lewisham and some from other areas interested in mental health services. We also had a few researchers from universities wanted to speak to carers about their research.

Continue reading →

Working carer research

Bridge Connections Coaching Consultancy are currently researching working carers and working parents experiences with employers when caring for dependants or loved ones with mental health challenges. My aim is to look at experiences and see where employers can increase wellbeing care, strategies and solutions to support the retainment of employee carers/parents whilst they are expected to show up for work, whether it be short-term or long-term.

It would start off with a questionnaire, then a short interview, to gather input.

From their experience, they feel there is an area where the working person providing care does not get enough individual wellbeing care, to continue to work effectively, this is an area that they are currently looking into.

You can contact Ceylan Thompson on
coachingandmentoringlifeskills@gmail.com

Black Thrive Employment Project: improving outcomes for Lambeth residents with long-term conditions

Black Thrive is a partnership between communities, statutory bodies, voluntary organisations and the private sector. We work together to reduce the inequalities and injustices experienced by Black people in Lambeth.

According to the GSTC “One to Many” report, more than 1 in 5 residents in Lambeth live with at least one long-term condition. Over 19,000 live with multiple long-term conditions (three or more). Even though Black communities make up 18% of Lambeth’s adult population, they account for 27% of people with multiple long-term conditions. Furthermore,

in Lambeth, Black residents are four times more likely to be unemployed than white residents. When they are employed, they are disproportionately engaged in insecure, low-paid and dangerous work, which harms mental and physical health. In addition, Black people can face racism and discrimination in the workplace, which negatively impacts mental well-being.

Therefore, we know that people of African and African Caribbean descent in Lambeth are more likely to be unemployed and more likely to have poor health. One of the key drivers of these inequalities is structural racism and the fact that our current healthcare and employment systems prevent Black people from thriving.

As a result, in collaboration with Guy’s and St. Thomas’ Charity (GSTC), Black Thrive’s Employment Project is developing community-led solutions for improving employment outcomes for Black people with long-term conditions. Our goal is to ensure that Black people in Lambeth with long-term conditions are as likely to be in and sustain, meaningful employment as equivalent white people.

To do this, Black Thrive is partnering with community members, statutory bodies and local organisations to achieve justice for the Black community through radical systems change. In September 2020, we launched our £300,000 grant fund to pilot projects that consider the lived experience of Black people with long-term conditions and have the potential to create systemic change. Projects should test and pilot new ideas that have the potential to shift the dial on employment outcomes and improve the evidence base around what works for Black people in Lambeth with long-term conditions.

The fund was managed and distributed by our Employment Working Group; a group of local Black residents with lived experience of managing one or multiple long-term conditions. We believe that prioritising community-power and lived experience is a radical way of funding new and exciting initiatives that may be overlooked by the traditional system. After receiving 84 applications, the Employment Working Group decided to fund 8 projects – the vast majority of which are led by Black and disabled people.

Funded projects include a radical self-care and wellness to work programme, the creation of a network of Black social entrepreneurs, supporting those recovering from mental illness and substance addiction back into employment through dog day-care traineeships and empowering Black people to develop employability skills through social action. To read more about all 8 projects please visit: https://employment.blackthrive.org.uk/our-grantees/

As the projects begin recruiting participants, it is important we ensure that the opportunities available reach the most marginalised people. This is a form of systems change in itself, as it will allow those people who fall outside of traditional referral pathways for services to still access support. 

Given that carers have an intimate and trusting relationship with their loved ones based on an acute understanding of their needs, interests and goals, they are a vital network which cannot be overlooked! We strongly encourage all Lambeth-based Black carers to review the projects on offer, share them widely within your networks and follow the sign-up process if you, or someone you know, is interested in taking part.

If you have any questions about the Black Thrive Employment Project, please email: employment@blackthrive.org.uk

Black Thrive Employment Project Grantees

Royal College of Psychiatrist Lived Experience project

The Royal College of Psychiatrists are collecting stories from people with lived experience of long term mental health conditions. These stories will support the work of the Royal College of Psychiatrist’s Faculty of Rehabilitation & Social Psychiatry. The Faculty is made up of psychiatrists, service users and carer representatives with experience of psychiatric rehabilitation services. The Royal College of Psychiatrist want to understand and represent such experiences.

You can download the Lived experienced submission form in the link below.

rcp-rse-stories-of-lived-exp-form-final-kpDownload

Some of the stories collected will be placed on the Royal College of Psychiatrist Faculty website.  They may also use them in future reports and campaigns.

The Royal College of Psychiatrist appreciate that sharing your story with others can be difficult; you may need support from carers or the individual who has invited you to participate.

Taking part in their project is entirely voluntary, and stories will be anonymised.

Patients and carers with lived experience are leading on this project.

Any queries about the project please email stella.galea@rcpsych.ac.uk.

Patient and Carer Race Equality Framework at SLaM

Welcome back and thanks for stopping by. Have you ever heard of PCREF? There was a blog about it in 2019 regarding mental health inequalities for black people. Mental Health outcomes for those from the Afro-Caribbean community has been very poor for a long time. So there has to be some form of change, but how can this go about? I think it starts with the community and a way for black people to come together and query how mental health services and support the community.

The blog about health inequalities from NHS England is below.

https://www.england.nhs.uk/blog/how-can-we-have-the-same-outcomes-when-were-not-having-the-same-experiences/

South London & Maudsley short for SLaM are one of the mental health trusts looking to work with the black community on ways to support wellbeing and close the inequalities gap.

I recently made a short video as an intro into black health inequalities, although its not going to be the only video I am working on.

They are looking for members of the Black community to attend a series of events SLaM call ‘Fit for Partnership’. These events well focus on four boroughs they run services.

  • Croydon’s Black Community:  Tuesday 19 January, 6pm – 8pm:  Register here
  • For more information email:  CroydonIAG@bmeforum.org  

There will also be a Black service users and carers event, where details are below:

Four borough Service User and Carer event:  Thursday 4 February, 1pm – 3pm:  Register here 

For more information email PCREFapproach@slam.nhs.uk 

Well done to Alan Worthington – Triangle of Care

Welcome back to my first blog post of 2021 and I have exciting news. I have just heard some days ago carer Alan Worthington got an OBE from the New Years honours. When I found this out, I was overjoyed. If you do not know who Alan Worthington is. Alan was instrumental in the creation of The Triangle of Care.

Alan Worthington – Founder of Triangle of Care

The Triangle of Care has been around for some time, I believe 2010. The Triangle of Care is a set of policies to involve families and carers in the decisions and care of those suffering mental ill health, especially inpatient settings on mental health hospitals.

Triangle of Care Logo

With the support of national carer charity Carer’s Trust and National Mental Health Development Unit, Alan worked so hard to help implement the policy for mental health trusts.

When a mental health trust wants to sign up to the triangle of care, they need to self-assess how families and carers are involved and supported regarding mental health services. Once self assessment of services is complete then the trust can identify what needs to improve in comparison to the triangle of care’s six policies as in.

  • Carers and the essential role they play are identified at first contact or as soon as possible thereafter.
  • Staff are “carer aware” and trained in carer engagement strategies.
  • Policy and protocols re; confidentiality and sharing information are in place.
  • Defined post(s) responsible for carers are in place.
  • A carer introduction to the service and staff is available, with a relevant range of information across the acute care pathway.
  • A range of carer support services is available.

All too often carers can be shut out of the care for their loved ones as all too often Mental Health professionals get the last word. When things go wrong, people finally ask the question “What did you ask the carer about the situation”? It is like families and carers are screaming to be involved, but something is pushing them out.

The aim is to increase involvement and communication between patient, health professional and carer. As in the past all to often there has been an imbalance of communication. There have probably been dozen’s of involvement policies from a patient or MH professionals perspective, but with the triangle of care we get the family and carer influence.

Over the years many mental health trusts have rose up to the challenge and signed up for The Triangle of Care. Below is a list of some of the Mental Health NHS trusts who have signed up and are currently working with triangle of care.

Birmingham & Solihull Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust
Bradford District Care Foundation Trust
Devon Partnership NHS Trust
Dorset Healthcare University NHS Foundation Trust
Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust
Leeds & York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust
Livewell South West
Pennine Care NHS Foundation Trust
South Staffordshire & Shropshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust
South West London and St George’s Mental Health NHS Trust
Sussex Partnership NHS Trust
West London Mental Health NHS Trust.
Camden and Islington NHS Foundation Trust.
Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust.
Coventry and Warwickshire Partnership NHS Trust.
Cumbria Partnership NHS Foundation Trust.
Southern Healthcare.
Kent and Medway NHS and Social Care Partnership Trust
Lincolnshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust
Mersey Care NHS Trust
Norfolk & Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust
Northumberland, Tyne and Wear NHS Foundation Trust
Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust
Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust
Somerset Partnership NHS Foundation Trust
Surrey and Borders Partnership NHS Foundation Trust
Tees Esk and Wear Valley NHS Foundation Trust.

It is with the hard work of Alan Worthington and Carer’s Trust that the triangle of care has made such a difference in families and carer’s lives. I myself as a carer activist got involved with the triangle of care because I felt so passionate about the cause. I certainly have to thank Ruth Hannan who inspired myself and others to make a difference and help shape the Triangle of care.

I would like to finish off stating that I am excited South London & Maudsley have taken the challenge to sign up to the Triangle of care and I look forward to see how they can set an example like other trusts currently on The Triangle of Care scheme. There is still much work to do and one should never fully rest on their laurels, but congratulations to Alan for all his achievements.

We can hope the triangle of care continues to work its magic for many across the country and that carers should always be counted.