Tag Archives: black communities

Have Your Say: Supporting Safer Mental Health Discharge for Black Communities

If you’ve supported someone through a stay in mental health services, your experience could help improve care for others.

Researchers at The University of Manchester are inviting people with lived experience—including carers to take part in an online workshop focused on improving how mental health services support people during hospital discharge, particularly for individuals from Black heritage communities.

Reason for research

Evidence shows that people from Black communities often face poorer outcomes in mental health care, including barriers to access and challenges during discharge from hospital.

To address this, researchers are working to make future services and research more inclusive, culturally responsive, and grounded in real experiences. Hearing directly from carers is a key part of that work .

Who is running this?

The workshop is being led by Dr Natasha Tyler, a Research Fellow at The University of Manchester, as part of work linked to improving future research and care approaches.

The session will also be supported by facilitators with lived experience, including carers, to ensure discussions are grounded and meaningful .

Who can take part?

You may be interested if you:

  • Have cared for someone who has been an inpatient in adult mental health services
  • Have experience of discharge from mental health care
  • Want to share your perspective to improve future support

What’s involved?

  • Format: Online (MS Teams)
  • Duration: 2 hours
  • Dates: Sessions planned between 23rd April and 8th May 2026
  • Payment: £60 as a thank-you for your time

Participants will receive questions in advance to help prepare for the discussion.

Why get involved?

Taking part is a chance to:

  • Help shape future mental health research and services
  • Ensure carers’ voices are included in decision-making
  • Contribute to reducing inequalities in care
  • Share your experience in a supportive environment

How to express interest

If you’d like to take part, you can follow the link in the invitation to share your availability or contact the research team directly.

https://doodle.com/meeting/organize/id/dwy8n1Ma

You’re also welcome to share this opportunity with others who may be interested. For more info, contact Dr Natasha at natasha.tyler@manchester.ac.uk

Ethnic mental health Carer Forum : October Update 2025

By Matthew McKenzie, Facilitator, National Ethnic Mental Health Carer Forum

Introduction: A Forum that Connects and Challenges

As the facilitator of the National Ethnic Mental Health Carer Forum, I never take for granted how special these sessions are. Each month, carers, professionals, and researchers from all over the UK log in to share knowledge, raise awareness, and push for change in how mental health services understand and support ethnic minority communities.

Our October 2025 session was a powerful one. Falling on the last day of Black History Month, it brought together crucial themes on race equality, co-production, research, and carer visibility.

We heard from two key areas shaping mental health equity right now:

  • The OSMOSIS Project, led by Dr. Jacqueline Sin and Sharon Galliford, focusing on developing social care-based support for carers of people with psychosis.
  • The Patient and Carer Race Equality Framework (PCREF), presented by Aboobaker Bhana, Equality and Involvement Manager for South West Yorkshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust.
Continue reading →

Addressing Parkinsons with Black communities

Welcome back to another blog post by carer activist and Carers UK volunteer Matthew McKenzie. This blog post is focused on the upcoming event aimed at black communities to address Parkinsons.

The event will be hosted by Parkinsons UK who fight hard to raise awareness of parkinsons and promote better treatment and services for those affected by Parkinsons disease.

Parkinsons disease does not discriminate, although parkinsons usually affect those at an older age, it can affect others from any age, race or social standing. Parkinsons is a devasting illness and can easily put a strain on families and whole communities. This includes those from the black community

To increase awareness of how Parkinsons can affect the black community, we must come together to learn and discuss what steps we can taken to reduce the impact of the disease. It is not only the impact on the person diagnosed with Parkinsons, but also the family and carer trying to improve quality of life.

Taken from Parkinsons UK website. Parkinson’s is a progressive neurological condition. This means that it causes problems in the brain and gets worse over time.

People with Parkinson’s don’t have enough of the chemical dopamine in their brain because some of the nerve cells that make it have stopped working. Around 153,000 people live with Parkinson’s in the UK. And it’s the fastest growing neurological condition in the world.

The event Parkinsons UK is running is called “Addressing Parkinsons with black communities” This will take place online for both Wednesday 8th May and also Saturday 11th of May from 12pm – 4 pm.

I am proud to take part for the event on the 11th of May where I will cover how Parkinsons can affect carers and what steps carers can take to reduce the impact.

You can book online through the link below

https://www.parkinsons.org.uk/events/addressing-parkinsons-black-communities-uk

Please look out for my blog and video for “World Parkinson day” – which is on 11th of April.

Thanks for reading.