1. Healthwatch East Sussex
East Sussex Assembly Annual Conference th September 2016

2. Volunteer and Community Liaison Manager
Elizabeth Mackie
Volunteer and Community Liaison Manager

3. Mental Health in East Sussex
Views and perspectives from local Healthwatch - what people told Healthwatch East Sussex. How we can work in partnership to best support and improve the lives of people living with mental health problems in East Sussex?

4. What is Healthwatch? Created as part of the NHS Reforms
‘Consumer’ watchdog for Health & Social Care – championing patient user voice
Independent
‘Corporate Body’
Statutory powers
Additional functions – strengthening the consumer/user voice
Healthwatch England
Health & Well-being Board

5. Seven Key Functions…
Gathering views and understanding the experiences of patients and the public
Making peoples’ views known
Promoting and supporting the involvement of people in the commissioning and provision of local care services and how they are scrutinised
Recommending investigation or special review of services via Healthwatch England or directly to the Care Quality Commission (CQC)
Providing advice and information about access to services and support for making informed choices
Making the views and experiences of people known to Healthwatch England and providing a steer to help it carry out its role as national champion
NHS Complaints Advocacy

6. Mental Health in East Sussex
Views and perspectives from local Healthwatch …what people told Healthwatch East Sussex

7. Accessing Child and Adolescent Mental Health services (CAMHs)
Our Activity
Listening to our communities - From people and their carers, who use mental health services
We Listened: report of findings from five mental health listening events around the county Dec 2013 – Feb 2014
Identified areas for further activity:
Mental Healthline – which provides telephone support; and
Accessing Child and Adolescent Mental Health services (CAMHs)
To further assist Healthwatch East Sussex understand what mental health services are delivered locally;
Orientation visits were undertaken at a number of services.

8. Main Themes
Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHs) – overwhelming view was that the service is very good but waiting times are an issue (August 2015)
CAMHs needs to consider how it can improve waiting time. For most people 18 weeks is too long
Mental Healthline needs to manage expectations of the level of support that can be provided for individuals via the telephone service
Calls are time limited and are of variable quality
Evidence from people receiving the service suggests that there are major gaps
Samaritans and NHS 111 – Samaritans have time to listen and have a text service
NHS 111 useful, put people in touch with out of hours GP service, and provide access to mental health services

9. Our feedback July 2016
Fewer individuals in crisis directly contacting HWES – systems appear to be responding, However… Some people in East Sussex are still experiencing difficulties accessing support when in crisis Individual’s in the community are wanting to assist their fellow citizens but experience challenges when trying to access professionals who able to assist (Multi agencies) Better access to information and education about mental health Concerns around older people with depression in the community and in care homes. (Social isolation)

10. How we can work in partnership to best support and improve the lives of people living with mental health problems in East Sussex?

11. Our Activity
Continue to gather independent views and feedback from local people
Continue to make those views known to achieve service improvements
Encourage more people to share their feedback i.e. Red Bus Tour 2016
Continue to be involved in discussions:
Mental Health Partnership Board
Mental Health Action Group
Pan Healthwatch across Sussex Collaboration meetings with Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust
Bi-monthly liaison meetings with the Care Quality Commission (CQC)
Promote good practices (where services are working well for local people) through enter and view activity
Healthwatch England – national trends
Mental Health 5 year Forward View for Prevention, Treatment and Support

12. Moving forward
Healthwatch East Sussex – ensuring we are involved in discussions going forward
Support and encourage the focus on prevention
Improving patient experience; and
Using patient experience to influence service improvement

13. Strategic partners with whom local Healthwatch should work to achieve service improvements