Since we shared our last update in January, there has been further progress on the Community Mental Health Transformation programme.
A significant development has been the award of £300,000 worth of grants to voluntary, community and social enterprise (VCSE) organisations. The grants programme recognises the passion and dedication of local VCSE organisations in driving forward new and existing community-based services.
These groups are already providing invaluable support in our communities. By working in partnership, and collaborating across organisations, we can ensure that more people who need support can be reached, and that improved mental health services offer more choice for people living with mental health challenges.
The first round of grants closed in October 2023 and the successful schemes were as follows:
- Gloucester City mission – to provide two more part-time counsellors in delivering counselling sessions for homeless men with complex needs.
- Creative Sustainability – for a Peer-to-Peer mentor support programme that enables the most vulnerable young people (18 to 25 years) to participate in activities safely and meaningfully.
- The Place Outside CIC – for the running of weekly sessions to support the social and emotional mental health and wellbeing of men through facilitated time in the natural environment.
- The Nelson Trust – Empowering Resilience: Integrated Psychological Support Therapies at Gloucester Women’s Centre.
- The Churn Project – activities and topics to support people with their physical and mental health and provide space to reduce social isolation and develop trusted relationships.
- Goals Beyond Grass – to deliver indoor football/futsal at the GL3 Community Hub, with a specific focus on adults facing mental health challenges or those facing social isolation.
- Inclusion Gloucestershire – Women’s Wellbeing Hub and Local Communities Mental Health Pathway Awareness.
- The Door Youth Project – to support the delivery of a Mentoring Gateway service for parents and carers. Focused on acute support, prevention, and early intervention.
- Artlift – to support the co-production of two projects. The Co-production group will choose themes/artistic/craft/creative activities that resonate with an emphasis on increasing involvement among ethnic minority participants.
- Friendship Café – to support the running of the café which is seen as a safe space for isolated and marginalised individuals and families in Barton and Tredworth, by facilitating peer support for people with mental health needs.
- Gloucestershire Counselling Service– to strengthen their resources to serve those with serious mental illness (SMI).
The second round of grants closed in January 2024 and the successful schemes were:
- Guideposts Trust – to pilot a series of online group-based interventions to help people develop effective emotional management skills to use when they are distressed.
- The Nelson Trust – provision of a dedicated therapeutic practitioner who can deliver interventions such as EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing), Art Therapy and other trauma informed therapies, supporting women with their emotional health and well-being.
- GL11 Community Hub – work with community action groups of people with an SMI to identify and deliver the training and support required to equip the network of Community Organisations across Stroud District for CMHT delivery.
- Listening Post – Forest Reach project – to support individuals with serious mental illness (SMI) in areas of high deprivation in the Forest of Dean through community mental health support and face-to-face counselling and psychotherapy.
- Art for All group – to sustain and build a community group providing art classes to people with mental illness across Gloucestershire.
- Kingfisher Treasure Seekers – Anchor Light programme – building on the current Anchor programme to support individuals with emotional regulation by focusing on a particular goal.
- The Place Outside – to enable participants to explore their own personal self-care for positive mental health and wellbeing, by accessing their immediate natural environment through nature-based practices.
Each of the projects will help support the development and delivery of the Locality Community Partnership model which is key to the CMHT programme. The investment will also ensure long term stability and growth in VCS support for people with mental health needs around the county.
You can see a fuller description of each project on our website here: Grants Totalling £300k For Projects to Support Mental Health > Glos Health & Care NHS Foundation Trust (ghc.nhs.uk)
For more information please email the CMHT email at: CMHTransformation@ghc.nhs.uk
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Locality Community Partnerships Locality Community Partnerships (LCPs) are now up and running across the county. LCPs are regular (weekly) virtual meetings, where members from health, social care and VCSE partners come together in a multidisciplinary approach, to discuss how best to support someone. This may be because they have a serious or enduring mental illness, but do not currently fit a single service or may have a level of complexity that may need a multi-agency offer. The LCP brings a ‘no wrong door’ approach, supporting clinicians, professionals, and service users in navigating access to community, specialist and VCSE services and supports the development of a collaborative, personalised support offer. So far, the LCPs have discussed more than 200 cases. Meet the Team The leads for the LCPs are:
The clinical leads have all worked in the NHS for many years and have seen how pressures have grown on teams and services. They say: “We are all keen to build relationships with our VCSE partners and primary care and adult social care colleagues to make the recovery journey smoother and to build on a culture of no wrong door. This is a good step towards transformed mental health care for people. We have already had many useful discussions within LCP meetings with good outcomes and are looking forward to see how this develops as well as continuing to build relationships with our partners.” In addition to the Clinical Leads, there are also care navigators in Gloucester – Bill Singh and Tammie Bell – and in Tewkesbury Newent and Staunton – Max Ward. We are advertising for care navigators in the other localities. Here is a brief bit of information about the Clinical Leads: Jo Workman- Cheltenham and North Cotswolds I have been a registered mental health nurse since 1998. I have worked in a variety of inpatient and community settings. Paul Jolly- Forest of Dean and Tewkesbury, Newent and Staunton (TWNS) I have worked as a community mental health nurse in the Forest of Dean for many years and recognise how busy mental health services have got. I am excited to be working with our partners from statutory, non-statutory and voluntary, community, faith and social enterprise sector organisations to provide the best mental health support we can in the community. Zoe Stoneley- Gloucester City I have worked for Gloucestershire Health and Care NHS Foundation Trust for the last 15 years across a range of areas including secondary care (community mental health), inpatient acute wards, HMP Gloucester and Improving Access to Psychological Therapies. I have fulfilled roles such as Team Manager, Registered Nurse, Health Care Assistant and Occupational Therapy Assistant. I have also spent a period working for the Gloucestershire Hospitals Trust as their Health Improvement Manager. I am passionate about reducing health and social inequalities, tackling tobacco dependency for those with serious mental illness, Quality Improvement and clinical education. Theresa Donoghue-Stroud, Berkeley Vale and South Cotswolds I am a registered Social Worker and a qualified Approved Mental Health Professional (AMHP) and Best Interest Assessor. I also hold a qualification in Adult Teaching. I have worked in the NHS for over 20 years – starting out as a domestic on the wards, then as a Nursing Assistant in Later Life and people with Learning Disabilities, before qualifying as a Social Worker. I have worked in a variety of roles, including the initial Crisis and Home Treatment set up in this county, the GRIP Team (one of my most favourite and longest roles), as a Social Care Specialist for Gloucester. I have also worked as a Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service Dual Diagnosis Specialist, and as the Lead / Specialist Practitioner for the Children and Young People’s Mental Health Liaison Team on Paediatrics. For further information, please visit our webpage or email LCP@ghc.nhs.uk Read more about Community Mental Health Transformation here: www.ghc.nhs.uk/cmht |
