Prioritising Mental Health Research
Many things are unprecedented about the run-up to next year’s general election, but perhaps one of the least anticipated is the prominence mental health has acquired. There has been something of a slow-motion pile-up aspect to mental health care over the past few years, as reports of the devastating effects of cuts, including chronic bed shortages and patients put at risk have kept on coming. Despite ministerial overtures lately about “parity of esteem” between mental and physical health, ask people in need of counselling or of a bed on an acute ward if provision is meeting needs and the answer will be an unequivocal “No”.
The core ideal of the NHS, that makes it so beloved by British people, is its promise of healthcare free for all. That promise has now become incompatible with the reality of austerity.
By 2020, the NHS will require an extra £30bn just to keep services at their present level. This strangulation of funds has seen the NHS Mental Health Trusts lose £253m, 2.3 per cent of their funding. These cuts translate into a dramatic loss of vital support for those with mental health conditions
The mental health intermediate care centre, which was officially announced on Monday, would manage tenant’s mental health and provide help with integrating back into society.
However, MM has learned that many of the staff who would be needed to run the centre are set to lose their jobs in April, if proposed Salford Council budget cuts take effect.
The mental health floating support service which workers are employed in will be seeing a reduction in funding of £214,000 under the council budget cuts.
Steve North, branch secretary of Salford Unison, has been involved in the proposed centre’s planning and says the announcement is a ploy by Salford Council.
“On the face of it this looks like a really positive development,” North told MM.
Manchester Mental Health and Social Care Trust (MMH&SCT) meeting at the “Service Users & Carers Forum held at Mechanics Institute in Manchester on the 28 Th April 2014 presented a draft document to the forum to be read and passed by that forum . The documents compiled by MMH&SCT Patients and Public Involvement (PPI) in Research Strategy referred to a *Service User* “Is defined as someone who is currently accessing mental health and/or social care services or who has used mental health and or social care service in the past three years (MMH&SCT service user strategy, 2010.
The Next patient meeting will be at 1:30pm prompt Wednesday 14 Th August, 2013 Manchester Users Network (MUN) will meet on Wednesday 14 Th August, 2013 at the offices of MUN. As part of “It Is Time To Be Heard” campaign. It will be an occasion to allow feedback from this campaign. A published agenda […]
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“Karen has always been a champion of her clients.”
Karen Reissmann, community nurse and UNISON activist, was sacked by Manchester Mental Health and Social Care Trust in 2007. She was sacked for speaking out about cuts and the effect of privatisation.
