Mental Health
www.wlmht.nhs.uk
Matters May 2011
Dr Nick Broughton
Medical Director
Safeguarding
children
Cubbon’s
corner
Peter Cubbon
As you’ll read on page 23,
staff from Broadmoor Hospital,
featured extremely positively on
BBC Radio 4’s flagship ‘Today’
programme on three consecutive
days this month. ‘Today’ is the
channel’s most popular radio
programme reaching an average
of eight million listeners every
week, making this quite an
achievement!
The programmes gave us the
opportunity to explain to the
public what really goes on behind
the walls of the Hospital in treating
patients and reducing the risk they
present, and the service it provides
to society in doing so. Our experts
(and actors, voicing patients’ own
words) talked about the recovery
we help patients achieve, how
we ensure security, and the vast
array of innovative treatments
and pioneering research we do.
We were presented as leaders in
our field.
My view is that external
perceptions of the organisation
are beginning to change. We
know from our recent staff survey
and patient surveys that we still
have a very long way to go inside
the organisation to improve
the quality of the work we do,
change perceptions and develop
staff pride in the organisation.
Addressing this is our focus at the
moment.
I’d like to thank every single
person who stepped up to
represent us (whether they made
the final edit or not) for their part
in promoting us.
There are many benefits of this,
not least that it will, I hope, give
our patients and their carers
confidence that they’re being
well looked after in the care of a
reputable organisation. Informing
the public honestly and openly also
helps to challenge the stereotypical
views many people have about
Broadmoor Hospital – and mental
health services in general. And
it’s the beginning of getting the
message across about recovery –
people with even the most severe
mental health problems can have
a meaningful and positive life.
And then there are the benefits
this kind of coverage will give
us in terms of recruiting and
retaining high calibre staff. My
hope is that this coverage will go
some way toward helping us to
instill confidence in ourselves and
others that we’re a prestigious
organisation to work for.
On that positive note, I’d like to
encourage you to nominate a
colleague, service user or carer
for a Quality Award. Again this
year, the awards are aligned
to our values of togetherness,
responsibility, excellence and
caring, so we’re recognising
people for living our shared values.
Can I ask you to think about the
outstanding people, or teams
of people you work with and
nominate them. I know from
talking to some of those who
won awards last year, how much
it means to be named on our
Awards list. So make someone’s
day, and nominate them!
Peter
chief-executive@wlmht.nhs.uk
Mental Health Matters is written by the
Communications Team, for staff and
patients of West London Mental Health
Trust. We’d love to hear from you with your
news or views. Do get in touch with us!
Ali Nunan:
alison.nunan@wlmht.nhs.uk
Telephone: 020 8483 2283
2 Mental Health Matters
Visiting time
Carers who visit loved ones in our forensic and
specialist rehab units can expect to receive
telephone calls for feedback from members of
our senior management team. Dr Anne Aiyegbusi,
Deputy Director of Nursing, says: “We’d heard
from other trusts that this direct approach helped
them to make improvements to the visiting
experience at their units. Every month we pick up
the phone to a sample of carers who’ve been in
to visit and ask them how they found us and how
their visit went. When they tell us about something
that needs to improve we can act promptly to
make sure their experiences of coming in to visit
are as good as they can possibly be.”
On the cover:
Dr Nick Broughton
and Josh (see page 15)
You can nominate staff, patients or carers
(for our involvement award) via our intranet
(Exchange) or website.
Call the communications team on 020
8354 8737 if you’d like paper copies
of the nomination form, or email us at
qualityawards@wlmht.nhs.uk.
Get cycling this summer
Order a new bike and make savings of between
40-50% on the full cost through Cyclescheme,
our salary sacrifice scheme that makes buying a
bike easy.
To join, visit www.cyclescheme.co.uk/9357ac
or see the ‘frequently asked questions’ at
www.cyclescheme.co.uk/employee-faqs
Information governance
Edwina Withe has been
appointed as Information
Governance Manager. She
has 16 years’ experience
in information governance
management gained in
adult social care and NHS
environments.
Editorial team
Tara Ferguson Jones:
tara.ferguson-jones@wlmht.nhs.uk
Trust news
Nominate now for the
2011 Quality Awards!
Edwina now manages the
information governance workplan to ensure
the confidentiality, integrity and availability of
information we hold at the Trust is maintained. She
also provides expert advice on data protection and
freedom of information (FOI) legislation. Contact
Edwina on 01344 75 4068 or via GroupWise.
Take a look at...
Experiences of psychosis, is a highly informative,
online resource for health professionals and
members of the public. Jonathan Souray, Ealing
EI in Psychosis Service Manager, describes it
as: “A step up in web resources. Particularly
helpful for those who have used mental health
services for a few years or more. Excellent
on insightful, thoughtful, intelligent and raw
service user perspective.”
We’re so impressed with it that we’ve created a
link to it from our own website.
(see www.healthtalkonline.org/
mentalhealth/Experiences_of_Psychosis)
Mental Health Matters 3
Becoming a
Foundation
Trust
In the
hot seat
Dr Nick Broughton
Nigel Leonard, Director of Planning and Corporate Affairs, who is leading on our work to become an FT.
A major focus for us in the year ahead is the work
we need to do to gain accreditation as a Foundation
Trust (FT). We’re aiming to achieve this by the end
of 2012. To become a Foundation Trust we have
to go through three stages of review, the first of
which will be carried out by NHS London, the next
by the Department of Health and finally we’ll be
reviewed by Monitor, the independent regulator of
Foundation Trusts.
In the summer of 2011 we’ll run a consultation,
during which we’ll be discussing the proposal and
benefits of becoming an FT with our stakeholders.
We’ve been making steady progress in terms of
establishing a strong membership base with the aim
of recruiting 10,000 public members. Having an
active membership base is a crucial component of
becoming an FT as it will give people from our local
communities a voice in the strategic development
and decision-making processes in the organisation.
We’re also preparing to run elections, later in the
year, to establish an active Council of Governors.
There will be an opportunity for staff, service users,
carers and local people to stand for election.
We’ve been working on a number of enabling
strategies. They cover areas such as estates,
membership, involvement and clinical governance,
and are key in helping us achieve our aims to
become an FT. We’ll be putting these supporting
strategies into action in the year ahead.
4 Mental Health Matters
What is a Foundation Trust (FT)?
Foundation trusts are free from central control,
and their strategic direction is heavily influenced
by people who use the services, their friends
and family, community members and partner
organisations. All trusts in England are required to
become FTs by 2014 and if they don’t, they’ll be
merged with another FT.
Why become an FT?
We’re trying to further improve our services by
becoming an organisation that is guided by the voices
of local people, service users, carers and our staff.
We believe that local, as opposed to central,
decision-making will enable us to respond more
rapidly to the needs of our service users and carers.
This offers the potential to significantly improve
patient and staff experience which we will monitor
through feedback.
Will we still be subject to monitoring and
regulation?
Yes, we’ll be required to meet all mandatory
standards of NHS Foundation Trusts set out by
Monitor, and standards from other authorities such
as the Care Quality Commission.
Our reward for good performance will be more
freedom and independence to decide how best to
plan and deliver our services to the local and wider
community.
Nick was appointed Medical Director in
October 2010, having been Clinical Director
of our West London Forensic Services.
What does a Medical Director do?
It’s my role to advise the Board on clinical issues so
they’re prioritised in all our decisions.
I provide professional leadership to the doctors and
have Board responsibility for medical education,
research and development, and safeguarding people.
I’m also the Trust’s Caldicott Guardian.
Caldicott Guardian?
This means I am the conscience of the Trust, making
sure that patient information is used appropriately
and that patient confidentiality is not breached.
What’s on your agenda right now?
The executive team’s focus is on completing the
re-organisation and establishing the new senior
management team for our three Clinical Service Units.
We’re keeping our Foundation Trust application on
track and supporting the membership campaign by
going out, explaining the benefits of becoming a
member and asking people to sign up!
Driving our research agenda is also important as we
strive to develop a strong research ethos across the
organisation, and we’re working to improve medical
education training.
Improving clinical governance is a priority. We need
assurance that we’re providing high quality care in all
areas. For example, I’ve been working with colleagues
in IM&T to develop clinical dashboards which will be
visible when staff log on, giving real-time information
about the safety and clinical effectiveness of services,
and about service users’ experiences. The dashboards
will help us continuously improve.
Also, I’m getting out to talk to service users, carers
and staff, in order that I’m well informed and can do
my job to the best of my ability.
Longer term objectives?
The future of the Trust depends on its people. I
want to help facilitate the exchange of ideas in the
organisation, particularly in the medical community, to
encourage innovation and quality improvement. I’ve
already established a forum for Trust consultants for
this and will make these more regular events.
We also have to press on with changing our culture.
The staff survey makes it clear that we still have a
great deal of work to do here. Our aim is to inspire
all staff with the ‘can-do’ attitude needed for
excellent care.
Will you continue to do clinical work?
Yes, I’m keen to continue because I really enjoy it
and after all that is why I became a doctor in the first
place. I also think it’s vital for me to have first hand
experience of the clinical challenges colleagues face.
How do you relax when you’re not at work?
I have a young family who I love being with, so
weekends are a special time for me. I enjoy playing
and watching sport, and I am currently preparing to
run my second marathon in Stockholm at the end of
the month.
Describe yourself in four words?
Passionate, loyal, dedicated, optimistic.
Thought for the future?
I find that people here can sometimes be downbeat.
However, we have many outstanding members of
staff and numerous excellent services which we
should be really proud of. In my view there is nothing
to stop us being the best mental health trust in the
country, if we all pull together!
Mental Health Matters 5
Redeveloping our major sites
Transforming our
London services
Work continues behind the scenes as we prepare to
redevelop Broadmoor Hospital and forensic services at
St Bernard’s. It’s essential so that high secure and
forensic patients currently treated in older Victorian
buildings will in the future receive treatment in modern
therapeutic environments.
An Outline Business Case (OBC) for the redevelopment
of Broadmoor Hospital has been approved by NHS
London. It’s now being looked at by the DH and Treasury
and we hope it will be officially approved this year.
In last year’s White Paper, we heard about QIPP,
which stands for Quality, Innovation, Productivity
and Prevention. This is the government’s drive to
improve the NHS by encouraging people within it
to challenge the way things are done and to find
new and better ways of delivering services. The
overall aim is to improve quality and efficiency.
We’re using this as a framework for the work
we’re doing to transform our local services.
Staff, service users, carers, GPs and other key
stakeholders are all involved in these discussions.
Speaking about the many projects now running
in local services, Gemma Stanion, Director of
our Programme Management Office (PMO)
explains: “We’ve established the London Services
Transformation Programme Board, to oversee the
progress of a huge number of projects, managing
the interdependencies between them and other
key programmes and making sure that all of the
decisions made will help us achieve our goals.”
Key projects in local services which are overseen
by our London Services Transformation Board
1. Last year, we reconfigured services in
Hammersmith & Fulham into assessment
and recovery teams. We’ve seen reduced
length of stay on our inpatient wards and
patients are being seen more quickly and
so they’re more satisfied with our services.
We’re now working to reconfigure services
in our other two London boroughs along
these lines.
2. We’re looking at our estate to see which
buildings we need going forward and
which are surplus to requirements. If we do
sell off buildings, the receipts from the sale
will go straight back into patient care.
3. We’ll need to develop new ways of
working, and to that end our organisational
development (OD) plan is being reviewed
so we’re recruiting staff with the right
6 Mental Health Matters
skills and offering appropriate training and
development opportunities for existing
staff.
4. We’re investigating having a single point of
telephone referral into our services, possibly
via our Contact Centre. This would result
in efficiencies and would make it easier for
us to maintain consistently high standards
of communications with our service users,
carers and other stakeholders, and improve
patient experience as a result.
5. Another critical element of the work we’re
doing is relationship-building with our
important external stakeholders including
GPs, commissioners, and local authorities.
It’s vital that we are clear about their needs
and ensure they’re being met in our services
for the future.
The plans for a new Broadmoor Hospital with 234 beds
(to provide flexible accommodation for 210 patients
plus space for decanting if required) will go to Bracknell
Forest Council for planning approval this summer. We’re
hoping to have the new hospital operational by 2017/8.
NHS London has approved our Strategic Outline Case
(SOC) for the redevelopment of St Bernard’s. Our current
focus is the submission of an Outline Business Case
(OBC), to provide a new 80 bed medium secure unit.
We’ll use receipts from the sale of surplus buildings
and land to pay for this and plan to have the re-build
completed by 2015. To achieve this, we’ve been
developing an integrated plan with our local services on
the site, which will support their strategic aim of moving
to more community provision.
We’ve been working on these plans with
our staff, patients and other stakeholders,
to ensure their views are heard.
Redevelopment Team
Broadmoor and St Bernard’s
Vickie Holcroft
Programme
Director
Vivienne Mowatt
Redevelopment
Programme
Manager, Service
David Phillips
Redevelopment
Programme
Manager
Managing the projects
Until now, the two programmes were managed
separately. We’ve decided to join up the
projects, so they’re both led by Vickie Holcroft
(already Programme Director for the Broadmoor
Redevelopment.)
Vickie says: “It makes sense to deliver them together so
managers on the project teams can share knowledge
and experience and make sure that lessons learnt along
the way are shared. This is a more efficient, consistent
and effective way to run two large scale capital projects
running at the same time.”
The redevelopment team
David Phillips – Redevelopment
Programme Manager
At Broadmoor, David has delivered numerous
capital projects, including a complex upgrade
to the secure perimeter and the new sports and
visits centre. He was also the Project Manager
for delivery of The Paddock Centre.
Vickie Holcroft, David Phillips and Vivienne Mowatt
Vickie Holcroft, MBE, Programme Director
Vickie was awarded an MBE for her work with
the Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals NHS Trust where
she delivered the relocation of the Radcliffe
Infirmary and a new Cancer and Diagnostic
Centre. Before that Vickie spent ten years with
South Buckinghamshire NHS Trust where she
was responsible for redevelopment schemes at
Wycombe and Amersham.
Vivienne Mowatt – Redevelopment
Programme Manager, Service
Vivienne has led on a range of change projects
including being operational lead for major rebuild
projects such as the entrance area of Broadmoor
Hospital and the development of a new visits
centre. She led an admin review at Hounslow, was
Project Manager for Agenda for Change, and the
development of the Exchange, and Head of Service
Redesign for Adult Services at Hammersmith.
Mental Health Matters 7
QUASIC training
We’ve invested in a leadership and management
training programme for band 7 and 8 nurses at
Broadmoor Hospital.
The training, called QUASIC, is based around six
modules of quality, understanding, assessment, inter/
intrapersonal skills and communications. Leeanne
McGee, Director of Broadmoor Hospital says: “We
chose it because it educates clinical teams about how
good management and leadership practices inform
high quality mental health care.
“Following a thorough evaluation, QUASIC will now
be extended to all senior nursing staff across the
Trust, where we hope to realise the benefits we’re
beginning to see at Broadmoor Hospital.”
developing leaders at
Broadmoor Hospital
(Sean Bunton, Alice Foyle, Peter Ridout,
Anne-Marie Seaton and Marcia Tharp)
This team looked at how staff spend their time
on a group of wards. They identified tasks,
that if streamlined, would free more time
for patient care. Examples include distilling
handover information down to salient points,
and consolidating the key facts about patients
in a single file by the phone in order to be able
to field phone enquiries more rapidly. They’ve
also installed clocks
on the walls of all
meeting rooms to
help them better
manage meeting
timings. Direct patient
care has gone up –
between 21% and
75% - and as a result,
violent incidents have
gone down, especially
on high dependency
wards.
Marcia Tharp
An important aspect is ‘action learning’ where
participants take ideas learned in the classroom
and apply them to challenges they face in their
jobs. At an event in March, participants presented
to the rest of their cohort and senior managers
the results of these projects.
Effective application of the disciplinary
policy (D4) and lessons learnt
(Dawn Hodges, Ellen Irvine,
Collins Munetsi, Robert Pollock)
Staff said that D4 as it’s currently used has
a negative impact on morale, is overly time
consuming and potentially distracting. Perhaps most
important, it’s not clear what actions result from a
D4 review and what lessons are learned for the rest
of the Hospital.
The team’s recommendations include a review
of the policy, including what offences should be
covered, but also
more rigour in its
implementation. They
said that mediation
should be considered
where possible and
that more thought
should be given to how
individuals affected
can be re-integrated
back into Hospital life
without distress.
Collins Munetsi
8 Mental Health Matters
(Evans Muswibe, Victor Igodifo
and Neil Ragoobar)
The training involved classroom group sessions
across a 6-month period, access to an online
learning portal and the use of a psychometric
questionnaire before and after. This helped each
individual better understand their own motivation
for leadership and their personal leadership style,
and track changes in these.
Project highlights
Time to Care
Critical evaluation of diversity
at Broadmoor Hospital
process map. This developed into a paper which
documents the process from pre-admission to
week 12.
Sunita Arjune: “The programme has helped
me develop as a leader. It’s taught me
how to better integrate the skills I use in
managing the ward and making sure the
patient experience of care is excellent.”
Modifying the care pathway
(Ken Wakatama, Suzanne Care, Colin Kelly)
(From the left) Evans Muswibe, Victor Igodifo and Neil Ragoobar.
The team focused on two aspects of diversity:
religion and language. Around 44% of patients at
Broadmoor Hospital are black or ethnic minority,
and are therefore more likely to speak other
languages than English. The cost of interpreters
is significant so the team looked at the possibility
of other staff doing this work. They also identified
the need for better spiritual support for patients
who are not Christians.
As things stand, there’s no standard tool for
assessing patients for referral between wards. The
team proposed that all referrals be sent to a central
point where assessments are considered and wards
allocated. The CNMs could then liaise over the
transfer, with the patient visiting the ward ahead
of the transfer and an outreach service from the
previous ward providing continuity for the patient
between clinical teams. This mirrors the process
through which the patients pass en route into and
out of the Hospital.
Evans Muswibe: “Leadership’s about
inspiring, being creative. Seeing ourselves as
leaders rather than just managers is a big
change. It was so good to spend time with
other Clinical Nurse Managers and now we
feel we have a real support network.”
Bringing Trust values into the
admission care pathway
Suzanne Care and Ken Wakatama
(Sunita Arjune)
Sunita Arjune
Sunita gathered data
from a range of sources
– community meetings,
talking to staff and
questionnaires – to map
existing processes and
gain an understanding
of staff and patients’
perceptions of problems.
Using the Trust values
as a framework, she
asked staff to use post-it
notes to stick their ideas
for solutions on the
Next steps
Each of the projects represents an
opportunity to innovate and improve
standards of care, bringing together new
techniques and ways of thinking learned
through the training. The management
team is reviewing the projects with a view
to implementing recommendations. In the
meantime, participants are bringing their
new-found leadership skills, confidence and
clarity about their purpose to bear every
day on the wards, so improving patients’
experience of care at the Hospital.
Mental Health Matters 9
Reducing our
waste-line
We’re making changes to increase recycling
services across the Trust. Lucy Smith, Sustainable
Development Manager says: “We’re putting
recycling bins in all corporate and non-patient
areas before we move into patient areas. Look out
for them, and please use them!”
What’s happening in your area?
We’re re-launching and developing recycling
services at St Bernard’s. Look out for the existing or
new recycling bins around the site.
We already recycle at our Hammersmith & Fulham
sites and at the Cassel. There’s always more that
could be done so please make sure you recycle
where you can and look out for the new bin
signage. We’ll be introducing recycling at Lakeside
when the West Middlesex University Hospital
launch their recycling plans, later this year.
Charlotte Robinson, PA
We’ll be setting up recycling at the Limes
next month.
Staff at Broadmoor Hospital started recycling in
some non-patient movement areas last year. We’ll
be rolling this out further across the Hospital in the
coming months.
We’ll be introducing toner cartridge recycling at all
sites later this year.
Staff show their get up and go!’
Around 40 staff signed up to this year’s national Walk to Work campaign, committing to
incorporate more walking into their daily routines. MHM spoke to some of this year’s walkers!
Maggi Branigan
(left) and Emma
Collacott, PAs at
Broadmoor Hospital.
“This is the first time we took
part in Walk to Work Week.
When possible we go walking
during our lunch break. We’ve
devised our own routes through
the wood or around the wall
of the hospital and the length
of time taken depends on how
busy we are in the office. This
helps us to feel refreshed and
ready for the afternoon and
keeps our weight and health
steady. We’ll continue to walk
whenever the weather permits!”
Emma Collacott
and Maggi Branigan
10 Mental Health Matters
Staff
‘Open Minds’
“I live locally so I walk to
work every day which
is a round trip of about
three miles. When I walk it
becomes my thinking time.”
Sharon Pettifer
Sharon Pettifer (left)
Accounts Supervisor,
and Jeanette Coogan,
Accounts Payable Officer.
“I took part in the historical
walking group at St.
Bernard’s arranged by the
Travel Plan Co-ordinator,
Mary Melly. There were 14
of us, it was a lovely day, we
walked for an hour taking in
the canal and woodland.”
Jeanette Coogan
Dr Rabia Farooq, Psychiatrist
This year we launched our mental health
membership and anti-stigma campaign, ‘Open
Minds.’ Staff have offered to be involved in a
range of ways from volunteering at events to
recruiting members through their social groups.
people about the frequency of mental illness. A
quarter of people will have a mental health issue at
some point in their life, and we need to make sure
that people know what to do and where to turn to
when it happens.”
Last month, ten members of staff participated in
‘Open Minds: Speakers’ Training.’
“Hopefully, by getting out there and starting
conversations with people, we’ll also help to reduce
the stigma associated with mental illness. That in turn
will provide people with the strength to seek help,
instead of shying away from the problem, or feeling
embarrassed.”
Participant Dr Rabia Farooq, who is a psychiatrist
at the Trust, said: “This training taught us about
the ‘Open Minds’ campaign and how it relates to
Foundation Trust status and membership. It prepared
us so we can go out into the community and speak
comfortably about ‘Open Minds,’ and our area of
expertise, in order to increase awareness of mental
health issues and help reduce some of the stigma that
is associated with mental ill-health.”
Participants found the training encouraging and
rewarding. Martin Reynolds, Deputy Director of
Hounslow services, said: “I’ve been waiting for the
Trust to get involved in a programme of this sort, so
I’m excited to be a part of it.”
This training is for people who want to make a
difference by going out and chatting to people in
the community about our Open Minds campaign,
whether to faith groups, schools, businesses or others.
If you think you might like to get involved somehow,
please contact member@wlmht.nhs.uk or
020 8354 8325.
“It’s important that we get out to community groups
and businesses to not only teach them about mental
health issues, but educate them on how they can
best look after themselves so they don’t end up in our
services.”
Clinical Lead Consultant for West London Forensic
Services, Dr Aideen O’Halloran, said: “I’m interested
in getting out into the community to help educate
Psychiatrists, Dr Pardis Mostajabi, Dr Ritesh Bhandarkar, and Dr Aideen O’Halloran
Mental Health Matters 11
Contact
One year
centre on...
Outstanding achievements
at Broadmoor Hospital
On quality target
“Staff at Broadmoor Hospital should be
extremely proud of their outstanding
achievements in meeting this year’s CQUIN
(Commissioning for Quality and Innovation)
targets,” says Peter Cubbon.
The Contact Centre team held an open day to
celebrate their first birthday. The small team
of operators has taken over 213,000 calls in
its first year, ranging from IT and estates &
facilities enquiries to forwarding calls to all
the Trust’s main telephone numbers.
Carol Dinham-Tracy, Contact Centre Manager, says:
“Since our opening, the Trust has been able to
rationalise a number of disparate telephone processes
into the Centre, which now provides a service, 24 hours
a day, seven days a week.”
This is resulting in cost efficiencies and is freeing
up the valuable time of clinicians and other staff to
focus on delivering services. It’s also improving the
quality of our communications with those who use
our services, thanks to the professional approach,
consistency of service and skill of those within the
Contact Centre team.
Carol adds: “We’ve been trained to respond to all calls
into our Ealing Home Treatment Team and have plans to
share this expertise to take the pressure off other clinical
areas, going forward”.
Lovena Cenizo
“This consistent approach will help us to maintain high
quality communications to our service users, carers and
stakeholders, improving the patient experience. “
Feedback from the open day:
“It was interesting to see how the incoming calls are
prioritised, queued and answered. I think the main
benefit I’ve noticed since the contact centre opened, is
that we now have a focal contact point for calls which
has cut out the frustration of having no one answer the
phone at the other end. So it’s certainly helped us to be
more effective and efficient in our communications.”
Joyce Watkins, Learning and Development Centre
Manager, Ealing.
“We’ve reduced fire service call-out costs, by taking over
central management of emergency alarms. This means
that when an alarm is detected, the team has a target
to call the ward or department, to check if a call to the
emergency services is required. In doing so the team has
almost halved the number of unnecessary visits to the
Trust by the emergency services within the year, saving
them wasted time and us money.
“Looking ahead we are looking to introduce different
types of services from appointment reminders to help
reduce missed appointments. And working closely
with departments, CSU’s and looking at ways that
the Contact Centre can help streamline some of the
current processes.”
12 Mental Health Matters
1.5% of the Hospital’s annual budget was
conditional on performance against seven
targets. Such targets are in place for all NHS
providers to encourage continual improvement
in quality and innovation in service provision.
They cover areas such as risk assessment,
communications, use of a recovery tool in the
hospital, patient and carer contribution to CPA
and staff and patients’ wellbeing.
Barbara Worts, Performance Improvement
Manager, says: “We had to produce a detailed
portfolio of evidence against the seven targets.
This was followed by a visit to the hospital by the
three High Secure Hospitals’ lead commissioners to
review the portfolios and talk to staff and patients.
“The assessors told us that they were very
impressed by the quality of the evidence we’d
produced, because it was clear and comprehensive.
Broadmoor Hospital
leads the way
A national seminar on the management of
violence in high secure hospitals was well
attended at Broadmoor Hospital recently.
Jimmy Noak, Head of Nursing says: “We had
representation at the conference from all three
high secure hospitals as well as the Department of
Health and NHS London. The conference explored
a variety of issues including prevention and
management of violence (PMVA) training and the
Members of the team, Carol Dinham-Tracy, Babar Hussain, Ann
Rowe, Khalid Khan, Mark Thomas, Fiona Watson, Jamshed Khan,
Oluseun Shittu, Ziaur Rahman and Narohna David.
They were also impressed by the staff they spoke to
who they felt were very knowledgeable about their
patients. They also complimented us on the work
we’ve done to introduce healthy living initiatives.”
Leeanne McGee, Director of High Secure Services,
adds: “This is good news in terms of our funding,
but more importantly it shows that we’re making
real progress in embedding quality into the everyday
work of the hospital. I’d like to add my thanks to all
who were involved in this team effort.”
legal responsibilities of staff. We also discussed
practical, moral and ethical issues by using case
presentations, one of which included service user
feedback which gave a powerful narrative about
what it felt like being physically restrained.
“I’d like to thank Dr. Kevin Murray, Clinical
Director, for his work in organising the conference
as part of a learning opportunity from the clinical
secure practice forum*. I’d also like to thank
conference speakers including Pete Turner and
Gail Miller from our PMVA team, members of the
Isis Ward Clinical Team, Capsticks solicitors, and
staff from Rampton and Ashworth Hospitals.”
* Clinical Secure Practice Forum is a National Group which oversees clinical and secure issues that are pertinent to high secure hospitals.
Membership includes all three English high secure hospitals, the Department of Health, the National Security Advisor and Performance Leads.
Mental Health Matters 13
Spotlight on
personality disorder
An insider’s
view
Josh
Varthouhi Ohanion
Vartouhi Ohanian is the Trust’s Personality
Disorder (PD) lead for services in Hounslow.
Here she talks about schema therapy and the
sessions she’s been running to raise awareness
and understanding of PD.
Schema Therapy
...is an innovative psychotherapy for personality
disorder. It aims to address “maladaptive schemas”
which perpetuate patients’ symptoms and problems.
Early maladaptive schemas are rigid beliefs and
feelings about oneself and the world that the
individual never challenges. They are self-perpetuating
and very resistant to change. Together with these
schemas, coping styles and responses are developed
early in life as a way of surviving negative childhood
experiences. According to schema theory, early
maladaptive schemas determine how an individual
feels, thinks, acts and relates to others and they cause
long term emotional and interpersonal difficulties.
Service users with borderline personality disorder (BPD)
not only score very highly on almost all of the schemas
but also exhibit rapid shifts in emotional states and
behaviour which makes working with BPD patients
difficult. In recent years ten schema modes have
been more fully defined and specific interventions
developed for each of the modes.
Research demonstrates that schema therapy leads
to recovery in almost half of clients with BPD and
to clinically significant improvement in symptoms in
two thirds, so it’s the main therapeutic model used in
Hounslow psychology services - with good results.
14 Mental Health Matters
Academic sessions in Hounslow
In running academic sessions, we focus on the
understanding of PDs from within the schema
model. We aim to help staff understand why
patients with personality disorder think and behave
in the ways that they do. Case examples are used to
illustrate the schema therapy model with discussion
around the interpersonal behaviour with staff. The
case discussion involves constructing a schemabased formulation which explains the repetitive
nature of the individual patient’s difficulties and
behaviour, with suggestions on how to manage
these interpersonally. Discussion also focuses on
professionals’ feelings and reactions to patients with
personality disorder.
The positive feedback from staff about the usefulness
and relevance of the presentations and case
discussions in their day-to-day work with clients with
this diagnosis has resulted in these sessions becoming
a regular feature of the work we do.
A participant at a recent training
session said: “The presentation
was both enjoyable and interesting.
It identified the complexities of
working with individuals with
a diagnosis of BPD, giving an
opportunity to discuss dilemmas
and informing practice.”
I had my first psychotic episode,
hearing voices, paranoid
delusions, when I was 17. It
was extremely frightening
because I had no idea what was
happening. I’d never come across
mental illness.
The first person I met at the Trust
was Dr Alex Doig - an exceptional
guy, in Hounslow CAMHS. He
was understanding, made me
feel less weird about myself and
gave me complete confidence
in mental health services. He
explained that I was unwell, but
that help was available.
There I was educated about
mental illness which helped me
understand my situation.
I’m told I have an undiagnosed
psychotic illness and perhaps
borderline personality disorder,
which is treated with daily
medication and regular talking
therapies. Mental illness seems
to differ from other illnesses,
in that diagnosis is not always
straightforward.
My family were shocked and
desperately upset. However, no
matter where I’ve been cared
for, staff have done everything
possible to re-assure my parents,
answering their questions. This
has helped me, immensely.
More recently, having turned
18, I’ve have had a number of
brief admissions as an adult
inpatient to Lakeside. I imagine
the transition from adolescent
to adult services could be tough,
but I’ve been given sufficient
support from staff to deal with
it. My observation is that adult
services are much busier and as
an inpatient, less structured.
A second episode of psychosis
resulted in my carrying a knife
which has regrettably led to a
criminal conviction. I’ve never
harmed anyone, but I had the
knife on me as I was convinced,
because of my illness, that people
were out to get to me.
What l’ve learnt on my journey to
recovery is that routine is essential,
as is the need to keep busy. In
adult services, I made sure to
give my days structure and I got
involved in the activities on offer,
which even meant giving the
pottery class a go!
And so I was admitted to the
Wells Unit where the staff work
compassionately to help their
patients get back on track.
They were friendly, professional,
supportive - outstanding.
I’m now being cared for by the
Hounslow Early Intervention team
as a community patient and I’ve
been stable for a while, meaning
I have more good days than bad.
It’s hard to live in the knowledge
that I may have this illness, which
stopped my education in its tracks
two years ago, for the rest of
my life. I’d just been awarded
fantastic GCSE grades, when I
became ill.
Although mental illness has
changed the direction of my life,
I’m trying to get back on track
and would like to apply to do a
foundation degree. To make that
possible, I’m doing everything I
can at the Trust to develop myself
and get the evidence for my CV
that I need to prove I’m capable.
For example, I now talk at the
staff induction sessions, which
I find challenging but good for
my self esteem. I’m involved in
other work which is helping me
to move on in my life, so that
one day, I’ll be able to put this all
behind me and lead a ‘normal’
life again.
I wanted to tell you my story
because in my view, people still
have an unsympathetic attitude
towards mental illness. And that’s
not just people who read the
tabloid newspapers!
I hope that by telling my story,
people will see that mental illness
can happen to anyone, and that
there is light at the end of the
tunnel. I also wanted to thank the
very many caring staff I’ve come
across at the Trust.
Mental Health Matters 15
A tribute to John Atkinson
It was with shock and great sadness that we heard
in February of the sudden death of John Atkinson,
a 33 year old EIS practitioner in the Ealing Early
Intervention in Psychosis Service (EIS). John spent his
whole qualified nursing career with the Trust, initially
at Lakeside and latterly with EIS since 2008.
Research
Trust partners with Imperial in
news new Affective Disorders Service
Jonathan Souray, Manager of EIS said: “John made
a very definite impact on many colleagues both here
and in partner services, on parents of the young
adults that he worked with, and of course, on the
patients themselves.
Professor Allan Young
“John’s charm, kindnesses, warmth and his sense of
humour facilitated good professional relationships.
I noticed this ability particularly in the field of family
intervention work, where his skill developed and
was appreciated. John was always willing to help
and sought to put service users’ needs first.”
“We miss John. Our team meetings are less
colourful without John’s wide knowledge of often
obscure local resources and his wicked, often
irreverent, sense of humour, as one colleague
accurately said! So, we will have many good
memories to hold and to draw comfort from - and
the fruit of John’s work with families and patients
will live on in their lives.”
Diversity spotlight
International research on lesbian, gay and bisexual
(LGB) mental health has shown that ‘minority stress’
arising from alienation can contribute to a variety
of mental health problems. Guidance from the
Department of Health tells us that gay and bisexual
men are five and a half times more likely to self
harm, and lesbian and bisexual women are twice as
likely to self harm.
Why?
There is increased risk for those that have yet to
or have recently come out due to anxiety around
societal stigma and possible rejection and this can
occur at any age. By asking the question during
the assessment, you can identify whether the user
is from a more vulnerable group, which will then
inform your risk assessment.
What should you do?
Ask about sexuality in psychiatric assessments and
explore whether the individual has ‘come- out’ to
his/her loved ones.
For further advice and support contact Maggie
Morgan-Valentine from the Diversity Unit
(Margaret.Morgan-Valentine@wlmht.nhs.uk) or Kay
Allen who is Chair of the Trust’s Gender & Sexuality
sub-group (Kay.Allen@wlmht.nhs.uk).
16 Mental Health Matters
Professor Allan Young is leading our new Affective
Disorders Service in Hammersmith. The treatment will
be heavily informed by his research, which focuses on
treatments for particularly treatment-resistant affective
(mood) disorders, including depression and bipolar
disorder. As well as leading this work at the Trust, Allan
is Chair of Psychiatry at Imperial College London. He
has joined us from the University of British Columbia,
where he was the Chair of Research in the Department
of Psychiatry.
answering questions thrown up by clinical
care and feeds back to improve treatments.”
Professor Young says: “I’ve been interested in the close
relationship between the body’s chemistry and mood
since I was a medical student. It was encouraging to
observe people’s dramatic response to treatments, such
as anti-depressants, often within a matter of weeks.
Since then, I have concentrated on affective disorders,
investigating their causes and effective treatments.
Dr Craig Ritchie, Director of Research and Innovation,
says: “This is an exciting development for
the Trust because it’s a great example of a
genuinely research-led service development
which has tangible benefits for patient
care. As well as professional development
for individuals, research offers revenue
generation possibilities in research-related
work, not just with commercial partners
but also through collaboration with other
academic institutions and public funding
bodies like the National Institute for Health
Research and the EU.”
“Our clinical teams are touched by affective
disorders everyday. I hope staff will
increasingly see that research is not a
separate department, locked away in an
ivory tower; rather, it plays a pivotal role in
Our Research and Innovation steering group is
working closely with Allan and his team to develop
the mechanisms so that staff in other areas both refer
in and collaborate with the new service. The aim is
that staff will work in the centre on their own research
projects and also support the centre’s team in referring
patients in for research trials.
Your clinical peer review group needs YOU!!
Are you interested in joining the Trust’s research
peer review group? It’s great place to learn and
be inspired by ideas and innovations, and share
fresh thinking on our work in mental health.
Peer reviewers give feedback to others on their
clinical and non-clinical research projects.
The group meets bimonthly at the Claybrook
Centre. Staff from all disciplines are welcome.
If you’re interested, send a one page CV together
with a brief outline of why you’d like to be
involved, to Maria Tsappis, R&D department, Trust
Headquarters, or email maria.tsappis@wlmht.nhs.uk
by 1 July 2011.
Mental Health Matters 17
Learning
Lessons
Think about
the family
‘Caring to Make
the Difference’
The atmosphere was full of energy as staff from all
disciplines shared their experiences of and learning
on incidents. Gail Miller, Associate Director of Risk
Reduction, opened on the theme of ‘Togetherness’
and said: “If we can learn together then we will
make improvements.”
It was a major coup for us to have Dr Peter Carter
OBE, Chief Executive and General Secretary of
the Royal College of Nursing at our conference
this year. He spoke about the important role of
good team working in embedding safety into the
organisation’s culture. We were also delighted to
welcome Malcolm Rae, OBE, an advisor to the CQC.
He said: “When an investigation takes place, people
are scared about being blamed. Clinicians should be
encouraged to ‘discuss, share, engage and explain.’
You can only learn when you focus on the facts and
not the people.”
Sarina Martin,
Head of Clinical
Effectiveness & Audit
“Never a truer word is said
than the opening remarks
shared by Malcolm Rae.
We need to take on board
the need to do things
differently. Martin Bromiley gave a very moving
account of a real situation where things had
gone terribly wrong. We need to understand
the whole thing not just the root cause.”
Jackie Scott, Staff Nurse,
Churchill Ward, Broadmoor Hospital
“There is something for us as professionals in
that we have to understand that things happen
and that there isn’t a punitive result.”
18 Mental Health Matters
Safeguarding children leads make sure our
child visiting facilities are of a high standard.
Mary O’Reilly and Steve Morgan from Mersey Care NHS Trust
There were a series of interactive workshops in the
afternoon giving staff the opportunity to pick up
tips on preparing statements following an incident
and giving evidence in court, led by Gerard
Hanratty from Capsticks solicitors. A dialogue
took place between Steve Morgan, Deputy Chief
Executive of Mersey Care NHS Trust and Mary
O’Reilly, their service user forum representative,
on how they work together with service users and
carers on incident reviews.
Gail Miller adds: “We had some inspirational
speakers. I’d like to say thank you to everyone
who took part and the Risk Team for making this
conference happen.”
You can view the presentations on the
risk reduction page of the Exchange.
Dr Manjiri Lele, Consultant
Psychiatrist, CAMHS, Ealing
“It was a stimulating
experience, with the very
interesting insight into risk
management in the aeronautics
industry and the concise yet
very informative talk on how
to prepare for court. I look forward to attending
future events with similar exciting topics.”
Sharon Brookes, Service Manager, Hounslow
“I found the conference extremely valuable and
I’ll take the information I gathered back from
the day to practice. The workshop about user
involvement on incident panels was very exciting
and I’d be interested in how our Trust might be
able to embed such practice. The lectures gave a
good overall brief of risk and learning lessons and
I found them thought provoking.”
“The progress we’ve made embedding safeguarding
children principles into care at the Trust has been
a tremendous team effort,” says Dr Clare Lucey,
Named Doctor for Safeguarding Children.
At last month’s Board meeting, the Safeguarding
Children Team shared a presentation on
achievements. Cressida Zielinski, Named Nurse for
Safeguarding Children says: “We discussed the
work done by lead professionals across the Trust
who’ve taken responsibility for ensuring that we
‘think family’ in all interactions with patients. The
leads have encouraged participation in safeguarding
children training, evidence of which is high levels of
attendance. They’ve supported our audit activities so
we have evidence that safeguarding children is part
of the culture here and they’ve helped us to ensure
that child visiting facilities are looked after. We’ve
recently introduced a safeguarding children element
into supervisions sessions too.”
Focus on the Wells Unit
Two of our adolescent patients from the Wells Unit
spoke to the Board, in their own words, about their
experiences. They talked about the environment
and staff with the right attitudes to keep them safe.
They described activities as enjoyable and relevant
and explained how the staff work with their
families and others to make plans for their futures
outside the Unit. They proudly talked about a video
they’d made, evidencing their point about the
efforts of staff to find activities which are of interest
and relevant to them.
Focus on Lakeside
Suzanne McMillan, Service Manager, shared an
example of a time when a young girl who’d been
picked up by the police was in need of a safe
environment, for a short period of time, while
other agencies sought to find an adolescent
inpatient bed for her.
Suzanne says: “She was detained under a S136
due to the risk she posed to herself, so rather than
being held in a police van we agreed to step in and
protect this vulnerable individual. We found a safe
area where we made her and the social workers
comfortable, and we assessed her. We quickly set
up a rota of nurses to work with her and identified
two who would transfer her later in the evening to
another hospital. The nurses were amazing and,
although initially distressed, she settled and spent
time playing cards with the nurses.
“There is no doubt that she is the youngest S136
we have accommodated and, for me, the learning
point was the need for the unit co-ordinator, on
call manager and CAMHS consultant to come
together to consider the situation and agree a plan.
I believe that because we came together and took
responsibility we acted in the best interests of this
young person, who was successfully transferred to
a more appropriate hospital later that day.”
Putting
We need to work together to protect the safety and
promote the welfare of all children.
safeguarding
Safeguarding children is everyone’s responsibility.
children values
The Safeguarding Children Team is constantly striving to
achieve excellence.
into action
Caring about children and their families is key to
developing a Trust that ‘Thinks Family.’
Mental Health Matters 19
Our West London
Forensic team
leads the way
Moving on up
Starters
Dr Aideen O’Halloran and Dr Paul Gilluley
Our staff contributed to an innovative and
educational programme at the Annual Meeting
of the Faculty of Forensic Psychiatry of the Royal
College of Psychiatrists, in February.
on forensic services and commissioning in the
economic downturn. Paul also teamed up with
Liz Allen from the Department of Health to run a
session on relational security.
Dr Aideen O’Halloran, Clinical Lead in West London
Forensic Services, said: “It was fantastic to see our
staff talking about the innovative work we do here
and demonstrating to others that we’re leaders in
our field. At the conference, which attracted an
international audience, our Medical Director Dr Nick
Broughton gave a talk on commissioning of services
and payment by results. This was followed by
Dr Paul Gilluley and colleagues running a workshop
“Dr Niamh Power, Julia O’ Connor and Alex
Whale from our DASS (Drug and Alcohol Support
Services) team held a workshop on substance
misuse interventions and forensic services, and
drug treatment programmes. Dr David Reiss and I
ended the conference with a session on court room
skills for psychiatrists. We worked on this with a
colleague from Capsticks, the solicitors.”
Teamwork in the Orchard
Service users in the Orchard raised an excellent
£822.29 for the Sickle Cell Anaemia Society,
British Heart Foundation and The World Wildlife
Fund. These charities were voted for by the
women through their service user forum.
The money was raised during events including a
Christmas fair, summer fete and on World Mental
Health Day. Women were involved in baking
cakes, competing in quizzes and selling items
they’d made themselves.
The women also took part in a Sports Relief mile
which meant walking a marked route in the
Orchard’s atrium.
20 Mental Health Matters
Events were supported by staff from all disciplines, some of whom are
pictured. Jackie Andrews, Vocational Worker, Kate Lewis, Occupational
Therapist, Augusta Bouka, Vocational Therapist, Lynne Palmer, Head
of Administration, James Fishlock, Physical Activity Advisor, Angelina
Masih, Vocational Worker and Vicki LeSache, Art Therapist.
We’re pleased
to welcome
Charlotte
Welch who’s
been recruited
to help us
develop and
manage our
travel plan
strategy. She
will be looking
at how staff
and patients
travel to our sites and the different
options available. Charlotte says: “I’m
really looking forward to getting to know
people, understanding their lifestyles,
culture and values.”
Jill Robinson has joined us as Professor
of Mental Health Nursing, Wellbeing and
Recovery. This is a joint appointment with
Bucks New University. Jill is a qualified
mental health nurse and nurse teacher.
She has a degree in social psychology
which was followed by a PhD from the
Centre of Applied Research in Education
at the University of East Anglia.
Steve Trenchard, Director of Nursing and
Patient Experience says: “I am delighted to welcome Jill to the
Trust, to this new role which we’ve introduced to strengthen
the mental health nursing perspective within multi-disciplinary
practice and research teams. Jill will take the lead for nursing
research initiatives across the Trust and work with multidisciplinary colleagues in the development of research ideas,
proposals and protocols.”
Leavers
Clive Bonnett MBE, Senior Clinical Nurse Specialist at Broadmoor Hospital, retired in
March. Clive worked at Broadmoor Hospital for over 35 years, initially as a nurse and
since the 1980s as a PMVA tutor. Earlier this year he was awarded an MBE (Member
of the Order of the British Empire) for services to healthcare. He won the ‘Lifetime
Achievement’ award in our 2009 Quality Awards and his team won our ‘Team of the
Year’ award in 2008. Gail Miller, Director of Risk Reduction, says: “I am very privileged to
have worked with Clive who is an excellent role model for others and will be missed.”
Bala Poinasamy, Clinical
Team Leader, Windermere
Ward in Ealing has retired
from the NHS after 44
years of service, 30 of
which have been at the
Bala and Anna
Trust. Anna McLoughlin,
Ward Manager, says: “Bala’s wide experience in many
areas of nursing made him an invaluable member of
our team. His phlebotomy skills were second to none
with patients opting to wait until Bala was on duty. He
will be greatly missed by all the team and we wish him
well with his plans for retirement.”
Victor Buckman, Moving and
Handling Advisor, said farewell to
colleagues after ten years at the
Trust. Victor’s now happy to take
a break, before he sets himself up
as a consultant, providing training
within his field of expertise.
Bryan Joseph, Head of Health and Safety says: “Victor
will be sadly missed. He was one of the most affable
and helpful people I have met, always responding
positively to requests for help then working meticulously
and diligently until a solution is found. On a personal
level, I will miss his ever-optimistic approach to life.”
Mental Health Matters 21
Leavers
After nine years as Chaplain, Revd
Derek Barnes has retired. When
he arrived at the Chapel on the St
Bernard’s site, it had been closed
as a place of worship for five years.
Thanks to Derek’s determination,
Christian worship was re-introduced
there within a few months. Derek
has supported a number of
campaigns including the promotion of cycling amongst
staff and patients, Fairtrade, conferences on the slave
trade industry and the celebration of Red Nose Day!
Revd Guy Harrison, Head of Spiritual and Pastoral
Care says: “I know that in terms of Derek’s work with
students, his years as a parish priest and his nine years
as a mental health chaplain, many people have cause
to be thankful for his varied gifts and commitment to
working alongside both service users and staff. We
wish him happiness as he moves into this new phase of
his life and what I know will be an active retirement.”
Evelyn Odderson, Nurse Bank Coordinator, has retired after 14 years
with the Trust. She said: “I started
here as a healthcare assistant when
I was a student, before getting the
job as nurse bank co-ordinator.
I’ve really enjoyed working here
where I’ve met so many wonderful
people.” Her colleague Amina Otieno says: “Evelyn
is so dedicated to her work. If you need any help, she
is always there, we will miss her.” On her retirement
Evelyn has plans to travel around the world.
Congratulations
Anne Aiyegbusi
has been awarded
a PhD by Middlesex
University and the
Tavistock Clinic.
Anne is particularly
pleased that she
was awarded the PhD without
amendments. Her thesis was on
the nurse - patient relationship for
people diagnosed with personality
disorders in therapeutic community
and secure mental health settings.
Anne says: “After many years of
clinical experience I wanted to
make a contribution to care and
the development of services in this
complex area, through research.
Practice developments are difficult
to achieve without putting in a
great deal of effort to get sufficient
evidence. It has been a long and
difficult journey in many ways, but
nevertheless a great privilege to be
able to enquire at this depth and
offer evidence for colleagues to
use to improve the experiences of
people diagnosed with PD. This is an
area I am really passionate about.”
“I’d like to thank Andy Weir for
his support and the Trust for
sponsoring the research.”
Anne will be sharing her findings
through conferences and seminars,
including speaking at the next
nursing research masterclass.
Pardip
Minhas,
an Ealing
service user
is delighted
to have
completed his
8th London
Marathon
raising over
£1,000 for the
Ealing branch of MIND. He ran it
in 4 hours 36 minutes and puts his
high levels of physical fitness down
to guts, determination and good
access to the St Bernard’s gym.
Thanks
Dr Patricia Rodenas (left) and Dr Maria Perez, a pair of Spanish SpRs have spent
the last two months training at the Paddock Centre in Broadmoor Hospital, observing
all aspects of the assessment and treatment of patients with Personality Disorder.
Outside In
Director of Communications
Lucy McGee
This month the emphasis has been on
the ‘relations’ bit of ‘Public Relations’
(PR). Just as in your work at the Trust,
relationships are the most important
aspect of our work with the media - but
the similarities end there! We try and
build trust with journalists but at the
same time, knowing they’re trained to be
critical, keep them very focussed on our
agenda and the messages we want them
to convey to the public.
The only way was up in our relationship with
the ‘Daily Mail’ and ‘The Mail on Sunday’.
We’ve asked them to stop talking about
patients at Broadmoor Hospital in a way
that seems purposely designed to incite
fear and loathing. After the tussle over
their last piece of coverage, we suggested
to the managing editors of both papers
that we meet to mend fences. Visiting their
deluxe head-quarters in Kensington makes
one realise how rarefied an atmosphere
some journalists work in and you begin
to understand how they could be so
unenlightened about the complex issues
surrounding mental illness. After 90 minutes
conversation they seemed a lot more open
to giving us a fair hearing on stories preprint and generally separating the Hospital
and its work from the notoriety of certain
patients. Time will tell...
BBC Radio 4’s ‘Today’ programme
gave Broadmoor Hospital more than
a fair hearing. I hope you caught the
‘packages’ on 9 and 10 May which
reflected the fantastic strength and
breadth of staff’s work with patients,
and punctured many of the myths which
surround the Hospital.
Our reputation as a centre of specialist
expertise progresses apace too. Dr Craig
Ritchie’s comments on the new National
Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence
(NIHCE) guidance on treatments for
dementia were included in numerous
medical and online journals.
Both Dr Michael Phelan and Dr Kingsley
Norton were quoted in a Reuters article
(which then spread like wildfire on the
web on sites such as MSN news, Yahoo
news and the like) about the dangers
of ‘diagnosis by media’ as a counter to
the popular speculation about Gaddafi’s
mental health. Hopefully this coverage
will all contribute to a more positive
relationship between the public and
mental health in general.
Lucy McGee
lucy.mcgee@wlmht.nhs.uk
They told us: “Through colleagues in Spain we became aware of Broadmoor Hospital
and its excellent reputation. We’ve been impressed by the multidisciplinary working
ethos, patient focused principles and service user involvement. It has been a very
positive experience and we are very grateful to Dr Romero-Urcelay, Clinical Lead, for
allowing us the opportunity to learn in an exciting and motivating environment.”
22 Mental Health Matters
Mental Health Matters 23
Every picture
tells a story
Staff health
promotion day
Membership
music competition
Indy rockers, Storey, have recorded a song about
mental health recovery called Wander free, to be
released in July. They’ve done it in support of our
membership campaign.
Rebecca Jones, Healthcare Assistant
Staff in Hammersmith & Fulham, had their blood
pressure, glucose and cholesterol levels tested
at a health promotion day organised by the
Health at Work Team. Information and advice
on healthy eating, drinking awareness, smoking
cessation and stress awareness was shared.
Anne Mulcahy, Occupational Health Manager,
says: “We’ve been running these health
promotion days at various locations across the
Trust to support our agenda of promoting health
and wellbeing in the workplace.“
Red Nose Day
at St Bernard’s
Staff and patients competed in snooker and
table tennis competitions run by the St Bernard’s
Gym and raised £120 for Comic Relief. Revd
Derek Barnes who co-ordinated the event said:
“By getting involved in Red Nose Day, it was
an opportunity for patients to do something
different outside the hospital, as well as have
some fun. Red Nose Day supports Comic Relief
to help raise money to transform the lives of
poor, vulnerable and disadvantaged people here
in the UK and abroad.”
24 Mental Health Matters
We ran a competition through local secondary schools
to design the front cover of the single. The winner
is still to be decided, but here’s one of the entries by
Notting Hill and Ealing High School student, Alina
Khakoo. She said: “Many people think that mental
illnesses are not ‘real’, and are a sign of personal
weakness rather than a biological disorder. If we
become more welcoming and start to accept their
illness, so can they.”
Pearl Ward
welcomes
new team
Pictured on Pearl ward: Hamedan Khan, Lilian Hove, Laura
Boddy, Dr. Brian Darnley, Kemi Sokale, Emma Foster, Dr.
Sian McIver, Helen Slynne, Jools Gamble and Dr. Medhi.
Staff and patients came together to celebrate Pearl
Ward’s new multidisciplinary team (MDT). There have
been changes on many of the wards in our forensic
services as we work to have a complete MDT for
each ward, to improve consistency and quality of
patient care, through better team working.
Lilian Hove, Ward Manager, says: “We’re pleased
to welcome our Consultant Dr Brian Darnley to the
team on Pearl Ward. Having everyone under one
roof will help us strengthen teamworking.” The
afternoon ended with poems and songs by the
patients about ‘togetherness’ and ‘caring’ and we’ve
published some of these on our website.
MHM is produced by the Trust’s Communications Team. Call us on 020 8483 2283.
Mental Health Matters is printed on recycled paper