By: Ivan Rudd, Public Health Specialist for Mental Health and Wellbeing

 

To: West Kent CCG Health and Wellbeing Board

 

Subject: Mental Health and Wellbeing Task and Finish Group

 

Classification: Unrestricted

 

Summary

The Mental Health Task and finish Group was tasked by the HWBB to review key issues and make recommendations to the HWBB on how it could support wellbeing and the prevention of mental ill health.

 

 

1.    Introduction

 

1.1   The Task and Finish Group for Mental Health was formed subsequent to a presentation made to West Kent Health and Wellbeing Board. The aim of the Group was to understand:

  1. Mental health improvement opportunities funded by Section 256,
  2. Opportunities for supporting employers and schools in prevention
  3. The need for a communications strategy to make sure that everyone who might need the service finds it easy to access.
  4. How can we build community resilience? What would districts/ boroughs, the various sectors of the NHS need to do to enhance this?

 

1.2  In this brief report we explain how we have addressed these and we make recommendations to this Board.

 

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1.3  The T&F Group membership changed overtime and included:

 

Ivan Rudd, Public Health Specialist KCC (Chair - Hayley Brooks Manager Sevenoaks District Council unable to attend meetings)

Anton Tavernier-Gustav, Sevenoaks Council 

Katie Latchford, Maidstone BC

Heidi Ward, Tonbridge and Malling BC

Sara Watkins, Tunbridgewells BC

David Chesover , Deputy Chair NHS  West Kent CCG

Ivan Rudd, Public Health Specialist KCC

Dave Holman NHS West Kent CCG

Sue Scamell, KCC

Jill Roberts, CEO Sevenoaks Mind

James de Pury NHS West Kent CCG

 

2. The role of Kent’s  Live it Well on preventing mental ill health and promoting wellbeing.

  The Live It Well Strategy and Kent’s Health and Wellbeing Strategy vision in Kent is to:

•      improve health outcomes,

•      deliver better coordinated quality care,

•      improve the public’s experience of integrated health and social care services and,

•      ensure that the individual is involved and at the heart of everything we do.

We have sought to use these themes in the Task and Finish Group’s approach to meeting Public Health Outcomes Framework priority – a reduction in suicide - a key outcome for mental health commissioners.  There are five core actions outlined in the Kent & Medway Suicide Prevention Plan which is being reviewed at this time. These are:

 

A summary of the revised suicide prevention action plan will be shared with the Board and opportunities for west Kent  to support the outcome will be flagged.

 

 

3. Gaps in Service Provision and Barriers to success

3.1 Communication with the Public

The T&F group identified that more can be done to make the public aware of the MH support that is available to them and those they care for.  We looked at the communication resources that existed such as the Live it well website – www.liveitwell.org.uk which was a key product of the Live It Well strategy.  The group recognised the strategy could be revisited and form part of a wider communication strategy and action plan to ensure greater understanding in West Kent of services available throughout the life course.  

3.2 Education and the Workplace

There are many initiatives within schools and in workplaces to maintain health and improve wellbeing but it is difficult to map them or to have a strategic sense of their quality in West Kent.  For schools, the recent changes in education has meant there is no direct control on what is offered in schools and governing bodies are able to set up the wellbeing and pupil support structures that seem most appropriate.  It is not clear how good universal provision is, and how it complies with NICE Guidance on Emotional Health and Wellbeing in primary and secondary schools.  There have been small scale reviews of compliance with NICE guidance such as when it was used by KCC Public Health to invite schools to submit an expression of interest in a school mentoring and web-based counselling service called Mindful.  Mindful forms part of a range of school based interventions to maintain mental health and grow resilience that will be evaluated as part of Head Start the Big Lottery intervention in Kent. 

Universal parenting provision. Parenting is most important determinant of mental health across the life course. It influences a child’s ability to benefit from primary education and builds the confidence and skills that contribute to a successful secondary education.  The infant’s emotional and social brain is very plastic and it is the relationship with parents that shapes it.  This dictates risk and resilience for mental illness and psychological distress throughout life. The current universal parenting support picture is unclear similar finding is also referenced in Children and Young people’s task and Finish Group and will require a multiagency input.

Data quality issues.  In our research into the mental health and wellbeing needs of the population of west Kent, we found data is poor on their ability to benefit from services.  Data is often not available at the level and quality required.  KCC Public Health will be revisiting data issues as part of an ongoing wider needs assessment process.

Workforce mental health and wellbeing.  The workplace is a key environment to promote good mental health and there is a range of guidance on how to maintain and improve health and wellbeing in the workforce.   Sevenoaks Mind is leading a major ‘Chatter Matters’ campaign based on improving health in the workplace amongst other objectives and it will link into the wider communications strategy.  We are exploring supporting GPs through the flagging of workplace wellbeing support on GP systems such as DORIS and will feed progress back to the Board. 

Six Ways to Wellbeing Campaign.  KCC PH have worked with west Kent local authority partners to promote workplace wellbeing and to begin to build knowledge and understanding of the Six Ways to Wellbeing Wheel of Wellbeing (WOW) mental health promotion initiative developed by South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust. The Kent Six Ways to Wellbeing campaign aims to improve people’s understanding of mental health and well-being – in effect, social marketing the concept of mental wellbeing as a ‘positive asset’ that can be grown by both individual and collective action.  The Six Ways to Wellbeing has the potential to provide  a unifying theme across interventions and can be used in the context of every contact counts.  The six themes are:

1.  Connect - with family, friends, colleagues, neighbours

2.  Be active - walk, run, garden, dance

3. Take notice - be curious, reflect on experiences

4. Keep learning - try something new

5. Give - doing something for others

6. Care - for the planet – sustainability

Community resilience in West Kent is the focus of an asset mapping exercise commissioned by KCC and will be reported back to the West Kent HWBB in the autumn. 

Section 256 Services.  West Kent CCG hosts the Programme Oversight Group is the strategic driver for mental health in West Kent, minutes and forward plan now shared with the Clinical Strategy Group. .  It was agreed by T&F Group members that this is the appropriate forum for developing Section 256 services. Section 256 provides funding for the Local Authority to support voluntary sector providers to provide the Services for people with mental health needs. The Section 256 agreement has been signed off and future plans will be shared with all HWBB partners as they are developed this financial year.

Conclusion:

Partners working together on the HWBB can help integrate the prevention of mental ill health and the promotion of mental wellbeing in West Kent. 

 

5. Recommendations

Recommendation 1: Delivery of a Communication Strategy and Action Plan

·         A meeting of communication leads across the West Kent HWBB partnership should be supported by the Board to work together to further develop a strategy and action plan that seeks to close the gap in the population’s understanding of services available. KCC Public Health will facilitate the development of an integrated approach.

Recommendation 2: Promotion of the Six Ways to Wellbeing themes

·         The Board is asked to support West Kent local authority Community Development Workers and other front line staff across the system to actively participate in presentations of Six Ways to Wellbeing campaigns in each District to improve their understanding of the six themes and and to encourage Six Ways workshops across West Kent.

Recommendation 3: Data Quality

·         The Group recommends that West Kent Health and Wellbeing Board receive an update during the year from commissioners reviewing the quality of service data available to inform future needs assessments.

Recommendation 4: Workforce Mental Health and Wellbeing

·       The Board is asked to note the growing interest in workplace wellbeing and to receive a presentation on what more can be achieved in West Kent.

 

Recommendation 5: Universal Parenting support.

·       The Group recommends the Board supports a study of access and barriers to universal parenting opportunities in West Kent; KCC PH would be happy to work with partners in this review.

 

Recommendation 6: Update on Big Lottery Head Start

 

·       Progress on the evaluation of the Head Start interventions will be shared with the Board later in the year.

 

Recommendation 7: Commissioning Section 256 services

·         It is recommended that the Board receive a report in the autumn on progress being made commissioning services through Section 256.