The meeting focused on carer involvement and representation across different regions, with participants discussing their roles in supporting carers and addressing discrimination. The main focus for this meeting was on “What does good look like?” when it comes to Triangle of Care and PCREF.
The group explored the Triangle of Care initiative and its five key elements, including discussions about medication-related challenges and the need for better communication between healthcare providers and carers. The conversation ended with conversations about improving carer support systems, including the importance of advocacy, training, and creating safe spaces for carers to share concerns confidentially.
The Importance of Ethnic Minority Mental Health Carer Voices: Empowering Unpaid Carers from the Global Majority by Matthew McKenzie
In today’s world, the voices of ethnic minority carers in mental health services must be heard and valued. The National Ethnic Mental Health Carers Forum meeting, held on March 28, 2025, underscored the vital role that co-production and lived experience play in shaping better services for those who care for loved ones with mental health needs.
On February 25th, 2025, carers, professionals, and support organizations gathered at Tooley Street for a Carers event provided by Southwark Council. The event was developed by Sarah Bullman, Senior Policy and Strategy Lead for Adult Social Care over in Southwark. The event, hosted by Simon Rayner, provided an opportunity to connect, share updates, and explore ways to support carers in the community.
Key Highlights from the Event:
🔹 Carefree – Presented by Salil Meech Mazumdar, Carefree shared their work in providing much-needed short breaks and respite opportunities for unpaid carers, ensuring they have time to rest and recharge.
🔹 Southwark Carers – Sarah Bullman introduced Southwark Carers including Verinder CEO of Southwark Carers, an essential organization offering tailored advice, practical support, and advocacy for carers in the borough of Southwark.
🔹 Mobilise – A digital-first platform supporting carers, Mobilise was discussed in depth, highlighting how online peer support and coaching can help carers navigate their roles more effectively.
🔹 Imago – Known for their work in youth and adult carer services, Imago shared updates on their projects that focus on young carers, connecting them with resources and professional guidance.
🔹 Carers Hub/Centre – Southwark council focus on a new Carers Hub set for next year, where updates on focus groups and workshops on how the carers centre will be used for supporting unpaid carers.
The last section of the event was below
🔹 Voice of the Carer & Carer Empowerment – Chloe Harvey and Sarah Bullman provided updates on Southwark’s Carers Strategy, reinforcing the importance of carer voices in shaping policy.
Plus Matthew McKenzie, a well-known carer advocate, spoke passionately about listening to carers, empowering them, and ensuring co-production in decision-making. He also read moving excerpts from his book, The Poetry of Mental Health Caring, which resonated deeply with attendees.
The event concluded with a networking lunch, allowing attendees to connect, share experiences, and strengthen their collective efforts in supporting carers.
This forum was a powerful reminder that carers should never feel alone—there is a strong and growing community dedicated to uplifting and advocating for them. 💙
As you might already know from my previous blogs. I am now a carer ambassador for Cygnet group. Cygnet is a leading provider of mental health, autism and learning disability services. As a carer I often use my knowledge and experience to provide insight and training over the years.
Some professionals might frown as to why service users and carers might wish to help train staff, but the voice of lived experience should not be ignored. There are many reasons why professionals should include users of services in training staff.
We should note that carers also use services as they seek carer support groups, information about services and sometimes counselling.
We use their services, although professionals are experts for a reason, they spend years training for their profession. They know far more about their field than I would acknowledge, but there is a big difference. Professionals provide a service and we use that service, if those services second guess what we require then this leaves room for errors. To make matters challenging, services do change from time to time and it is so important carers and service users feedback on their experiences.
We all need to work together. In the time of ever deminishing resources, it is a waste of time that patient, professional and carer battle each other to be heard. In the long run, we all wish for health and wellbeing for all of us. Working together means learning from each other.
Professionals can and will make mistakes, so include the voice of lived experience can show professionals are willing to learn from mistakes. These mistakes can come from second guessing what users might require, being pressured in their role or just not paying attention.
There are many more reasons why lived experience should be empowered to help train professionals. So when Cygnet group offered a chance to film my thoughts about carer experience, I jumped at the chance.
The film will be used as an online resource to all staff as I gave my views on the importance of unpaid carers, lived experience and carer advocacy.
I value an organisation that helps provide the voice of patient and care voices.
Those voices help shape how services can be provided and this should be the future of healthcare were we work as a team.
Hello everyone, welcome to the latest update from the Lewisham mental health carers forum, which took place on August the 28th carers Lewisham. I know I have missed a few updates regarding the other forums that took place in July, I am hoping to add those at a later date.
As a quick reminder, the MH carers forums give a chance for carers to get updates, engagement, empowerment and also query NHS services and policies. We had some good attendance for the latest lewisham carers forum.
The forum usually runs for 2 hours, however so much was discussed at this particular forum we actually overran. I gave updates from our local mental health trust, which is South London and Maudsley. The NHS Trust has been really good in engaging with carers forums from the Boroughs of Lambeth, Southwark, Croydon and Lewisham.
For those who are caring for someone suffering mental health problems, be it addictions, a form of psychosis, Compulsive disorders, serve depression and so on. This blog post is mainly for you.
As mental health carers we are often on the border line. If you are a mental health carer, you want to do what is right for whoever you care for. Sometimes Mental Health carers can find themselves being pushed out. Sometimes mental health carers are left being isolated. Sometimes mental health carers are ignored or bullied.
Hello everyone, welcome to the latest update from the Lewisham mental health carers forum, which took place on August the 28th carers Lewisham. I know I have missed a few updates regarding the other forums that took place in July, I am hoping to add those at a later date.
A Caring Mind 