NSUN news

Members Blogs

Claire Greaves deals openly and honestly with her experience of eating disorders, depression and anxiety in a blog which was shortlisted for the Mind Media Awards in 2015.

Dignity and humiliation in mental health care - After being sectioned in one of Britain’s acute psychiatric hospitals in 2011, SectionedUK has written hard-hitting commentary on mental health issues. This is a twitter conversation which took place a fortnight ago.

Ongoing battle to save Devon community mental health facility

A member of NSUN alerted us to an ongoing campaign to save a facility where adults and older people can access mental health services. The fight to stop the closure of St John's Court, Exmouth's only mental health unit, has been raging for over a year, with the campaign attracting celebrity support from Ruby Wax and Stephen Fry.  Read more here

Support and sign up to 4Pi, the National Involvement Standards

Developed and produced by people with experience of mental ill health, 4Pi (which stands for principles, purpose, presence, process and impact) is a framework for the involvement of service users and carers:  in our own care, in our communities, in service delivery and evaluation and in organisational governance and strategy.  Over 60 orgsanisations have already adopted the standards. To find out who they are, read case studies about 4Pi in practice, and get the resource pack please visit here.

Previously shared information available online

Please visit our website to find members projects, involvement opportunities, jobs and events we shared in previous e-bulletins. This includes our guides to support involvement in reducing the use of restraint in mental health settings.

Mental health service participant sets up and runs suicide crisis center in Gloucestershire

'I couldn’t find the right kind of help when I experienced a suicidal crisis in 2012 ' says Joy Hibbins, who set up her own crisis centre. Three years on, her service has branched into two units: the Suicide Crisis Centre, which offers support for people in Gloucestershire, and the Trauma Centre which also covers the surrounding areas, too, including Bristol and Oxford. In three years, the Suicide Crisis Centre never had a suicide of a client under its care.

The Suicide Crisis Centre and Trauma Centre have been described as “inspirational” and “extraordinary” by the South West Zero Suicide Collaborative, one of three pilot schemes for the Government’s zero suicide initiative.
Helen Garnham, the National Lead on suicide prevention at Public Health England has visited the Suicide Crisis Centre and has described its work as “inspiring”.

For more information about the services, please visit the Suicide Crisis Centre and Trauma Centre website here

Take part in a study led by the University of Manchester

Researchers at he University of Manchester are undertaking a research study exploring mental health service users and carers experiences of how well physical health concerns are incorporated into the mental health care planning process.

To be eligible, participants need to have had, or cared for someone who has had a UK mental health care plan. The research team is looking in particular at the quality of physical health information within the care plan as this was something that was raised as an issue for the service users and carers we work with. It is a fairly short survey which can be completed online here.

To obtain the survey in print, please contact Dr Helen Brooks 07552 007535 / 0161 306 7784 / Twitter: @Dr_HBrooks /email
If you wish to contact Dr Brooks by post: Dr Helen Brooks, Research Fellow, Division of Nursing, Midwifery and Social Work, Room 6.307|Jean McFarlane Building, University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL

West London Collaborative plan leadership course

This training, organised with Mark Doughty and the Centre for Patient Leadership, aims at giving you skills to work more effectively at senior and board level and improve your confidence and ability to have real impact. The course also provides 1-2-1 mentoring.

• 2 September 10am - 4:30pm
• 29 september 10am - 4:30pm
• 28 October 10am - 4:30pm
• 25 november 10am - 4:30pm

At the Grange, Warwick Rd, London W5 3XH

Places are limited, so please contact Jane asap by phone 0203 427 32 31 or email

Study into cognitive bias modification to help with paranoid thoughts

People invited to take part in a study into Cognitive Bias Modification to help with paranoid thoughts (CBM-pa)

This study, ran by King’s College London and the McPin Foundation, examines whether a new approach called ‘Cognitive Bias Modification for paranoia’ (CBM-pa) helps people who feel they experience paranoid thoughts. CBM-pa encourages people to develop alternative ways of interpreting difficult thoughts and situations. There are no right and wrong answers in the CBM approach.

The researchers are looking for people…

• aged between 18 and 65
• who feel they have experienced paranoid thoughts that they find distressing, for the last month or longer
• who haven’t had changes to their regular medication in the last three months
• who speak English

For more information and how to participate, please click here

Medical records could be up for sale...without us knowing

Campaigning organisation SumOfUs is concerned about a new worrying scheme to sell NHS medical records to big corporations. SumOfUs say:

'The government review into the care.data scheme was published earlier this month and it recommended the scheme we fought so hard against be scrapped. This sounds like a victory, but buried in the report is a new worrying scheme to sell our medical records to big corporations.

The government’s review proposes to allow our medical records from your family doctor, (possibly including our NHS Numbers, diagnoses, referrals, prescriptions along with our post codes and date of birth) to be uploaded to a giant national database -- but this time without telling us or asking for our consent!

One of the schemes to replace care.data is called the “Single GP dataset”. The government’s review into care.data proposes to send all patient records from family GPs to the central database without the express consent of patients. Once in the system, it can be “sold” to any customers of the ‘Health and Social Care Information centre”, including private companies.

The government buried this announcement on the day of the report into the Iraq War. It is hoping no one will notice this new land grab on our medical records. We can’t allow the government to sneak out the same medical record data scheme under a different name.

Sign the petition to stop the sale of our private medical records to corporations. '

Better health and care in East Kent

Better health and care in east Kent: time to change is a publicly available leaflet describing the case for changing health and social care services in east Kent.   It relates to a programme of work led by the East Kent Strategy Board. The East Kent Strategy Board was set up in September 2015 by local health and social care leaders to help determine how best to provide safe, high quality and financially sustainable health and social care services for the population of east Kent in the future.

Please take some time to read the case for change, and to share and discuss it amongst your groups and networks.  For example:

• Which aspects of this case for change do local people most agree with? 
• How can health and social care services support people to take more responsibility for their own health?
• How can health and social care services support people to be more in control of their own care?
• Thinking about health and social care services, what three things would make the biggest difference in improving patient experience?
• In the leaflet we have described a range of health challenges. Some of these are common across the country. Some are quite particular to east Kent. What do people think are the main challenges for east Kent?

Over the coming weeks and months there will be opportunities for you to share your views and contribute to the development of future plans.  Details of opportunities to connect will be made available on the Better Health and Care in  East Kent  website as they are finalised.

Department of Health owned websites: report for 2015/16

Report on the current Department of Health (DH) owned websites includes metrics on usage, accessibility and satisfaction ratings data.

Consultation outcome

Changing how healthcare education is funded
Part one of the government response outlines the basis of the government’s offer to nursing, midwifery and AHP students, including supplementary funding for travel, dual accommodation and childcare allowances.
The second part of the consultation response will include an updated impact assessment and equalities impact assessment and will be published in the autumn.
The consultation received about 1,750 responses.

#NSUNthrive campaign

It is 10 years since the 'Doing it for ourselves’ service user conference in Birmingham.  It was at this conference in 2006 that the vision of the National Survivor User Network (NSUN) was taken forward, leading to funding in 2007 and becoming a fully independent organisation in May 2010.

We have survived!  To enable us to continue to connect, communicate and influence, we need your help. Please spread the word to help raise funds to continue our work through our #NSUNthrive10 campaign. You can also raise money by shopping online with the  Giving Machine