Agenda item

The Head of Mental Health Services introduced a report that updated the Panel on Hope College and other mental health service developments.  The Panel was joined by several Peer Mentors who shared their experiences about the progress that had been made in the past year.

The Hope Recovery College was an innovative and comprehensive pathway for the local population which encompassed a range of services.  Co-production was a key principle of the College and the engagement of service users was critical.  Significant progress had been made in the past year including a wide range of events such as the Stronger Together conference on World Mental Health Day.  The future expansion plans for 2019 were outlined which included a bespoke website that was being developed, an action research project focused on loneliness and the expansion of the Peer Mentors working at Prospect Park Hospital.  The Slough Model that had been developed was considered to be best practice and a number of other areas had shown interest in learning from the local experience.

Five Peer Mentors each addressed the Panel to explain the role they were playing and their experiences in the past year.  This included their respective involvement in co-production; the Green Care scheme, which was the development of a green space at the Windmill Centre; and the regular open mornings at Hope College.

A number of points were raised during the course of the discussion which are summarised as follows:

·  How many people were using the services and how were the impacts being measured?  Data was being collected on outcomes and relatively small investment in the programme could generate significant savings in other services.  For example, in the first 12 months of ASSiST there had been 103 people in the first cohort which had led to a significant reduction in the costs of in patient admissions.

·  What were the links to young people’s services such as Kooth?  The services aimed to build networks and there were links to Slough Youth Parliament and with schools.  The aim was that the new website would be people of all ages.

·  Were mental health services working effectively with other Council services such as housing and benefits?  The challenges of inter departmental working were recognised but the team was seeking to involve officers from across the Council and make the right connections to achieve the best outcomes for people.

·  What was being done to tackle the problem of social isolation?  Loneliness was not always recognised but it was an important theme across the many events that were run locally by the team.  644 people had been reached by such events in the period between October to December 2018.

·  How were people referred to the College?  It was a secondary mental health service at present with relatively limited resources.  There was a dialogue with commissioning bodies to expand the service but it was sometimes difficult to secure mainstream funding for such innovative approaches.

(Councillor Chaudhry left the meeting)

Members thanked the Peer Mentors for their contributions to the meeting which was considered to be very helpful in understanding the work that was being done to support service users in Slough.  At the conclusion of the discussion, the report was noted.

Resolved –  That the report be noted.