Normal Service

As this Blog approaches its 400th post I am giving it, me, and you a break but normal service will resume in mid September. Meanwhile, follow all Hafal’s exciting activities and read our trenchantly-expressed views using the "Key Links" over to the right...

Welsh-Bashing

The Movin' On Up microbus is on its final leg through North Wales starting today at its one offshore destination - Anglesey. Just in case anybody doesn't already know about it a banner has been placed on the Menai Bridge which should do the trick.

The Welsh Government’s new Strategy "Together for Mental Health" was a key topic of conversation today. Our local Practice Leader Heather Russell-Hughes reports: "Here on Anglesey we, like the rest of Wales, are keen to get behind the Mental Health Service User and Carer Panel response to the Strategy. Consultation events ended in July; nearly 400 service users and carers supported the Panel’s views which was a great response. We are now waiting to see what the Welsh Government will come up with. Service users don’t simply want a revised Strategy, what they’re looking for is a delivery plan. Patients and families won’t be satisfied with anything less than a set of concrete targets for improvements to secondary mental health services which will hold NHS and local authority managers to account."

The campaign will culminate in a climb of Wales’ highest peak, Snowdon, in September. Heather says: "The climb has generated a lot of interest. It will be symbolic: we want to demonstrate how service users and carers in Wales can lead the way forward and take services to a new level by maximising the opportunities provided by the Mental Health Measure, the Carers Measure and the new Strategy.

"The climb also provides an excellent opportunity to take part in a physical activity - so important for mental health recovery - and have some fun along the way!"

Indeed, and I'm looking forward to my second climb up there this year. Quite a privilege. Or am I a glutton for punishment? Of course not!




Postscript:

Somebody I've never heard of but described as "ex-Corrie star Helen Flanagan" is being taken to task in the social media for calling Swansea "boring". Apparently she had to move here because her footballer boyfriend Scott Sinclair plays for the Swans but there is a suspicion that she wants him to move to Manchester.

I don't believe in getting cross with people for Welsh-bashing - all that outcry about Anne Robinson's jokes was just embarrassing and I recollect the Western Mail published a letter from me suggesting people chill a little about it - so don't let's criticise young Helen but rather let us share with her the sybaritic delights of Wind Street, the smart Maritime Quarter, and the National Waterfront Museum (well, no, not the Waterfront Museum which is boring) and, er, any other ideas?

Swansea is an acquired taste and I suspect Helen won't be around long enough to acquire it. No doubt our loss as I am sure she is charming.

An Unlikely Role Model

Just caught up with this picture from the Newport event last week - could make an interesting screensaver it occurs to me...

Meanwhile guess what I am mostly eating at the moment in the vegetable department? Five portions a day of tomatoes is the answer. Notwithstanding the awful weather Mrs Blog's greenhouse has delivered very effectively again this summer with the bonus of lots of cucumbers.

Outside the salads have held up well too - indeed the rain is good for lettuce, rocket and so on and the cool temperature stops them bolting.



Last night I watched an interesting programme on BBC4 about the Queen's mother-in-law Princess Alice of Greece. I had heard of her as an eccentric with religious obsessions but did not know that she had colourful psychotic experiences and was diagnosed with schizophrenia, leading her unpleasant mother and husband (the disagreeable and silly Prince Andrew of Greece) to hide her away in a sanatorium against her will and clearly unnecessarily.

It is much to her credit that, in spite of having good cause to be cynical about humanity after the way she was treated, she went on to shelter Jewish refugees in Nazi-occupied Athens at great personal risk and later did charitable work to help a deprived neighbourhood in the Greek capital, evidently experiencing episodes of illness right into old age. An unlikely but genuine role model for what people with a serious mental illness can achieve in contrast to the many worthless, dilettante, and obnoxious members of European royalty.

Take Control

Last week's Movin' On Up event in Newport was a resounding success with many visitors and excellent discussion about the campaign. I also enjoyed a good chat with Mohammad Asghar AM: because it was Ramadan he couldn't eat until nightfall but I pressed a couple of Hafal-branded cup-cakes into his hand so he could break his fast in style later.

The Mayor of Newport gave a fittingly enthusiastic speech to launch our Mental Health Foundation friends' new publication Take Control produced in partnership with Bipolar UK and Hafal. The publication focuses on the role self-management plays in achieving recovery from serious mental illness and complements Care and Treatment Planning: A step-by-step guide for secondary mental health service users which was published by Hafal (in collaboration with MHF and Bipolar UK) and aims to help service users get the most from the new Care and Treatment Plans which were introduced as part of the Mental Health (Wales) Measure in June.

Mel Cook, Project Co-ordinator at the Mental Health Foundation, said: "Take Control features people with a serious mental illness who have attended a Mental Health Foundation’s Self-Management Training course. It charts the progress they made before, during and after the course, how they became empowered during the process. It also offers advice on the eight areas in the new Care and Treatment Plans and how users can help themselves in these areas."

Take Control aims to help service users get the most from the Mental Health (Wales) Measure, a theme discussed by service users at the event. Hafal Newport service user and volunteer Lyn Cooper, who has experience of anxiety and depression, explained that it is crucial that the new law is maximised by service users and professionals. "Delivery is the key to the Measure," said Lyn. "We need it to be fully delivered so people know what kind of level of care and help they can expect to receive. It’s particularly crucial that service users’ Care and Treatment Plans are put in place so we know where we stand, what we’re working with and what’s being done to help us. Once all that’s in place then things will begin to happen!"

Pants

Taking the plunge in Swansea Bay, Mumbles visible to the right

On Saturday afternoon I managed only my second swim in the sea this summer, this time half way around the Swansea corniche opposite the Patti Pavilion, a good spot with free parking on the other side of the road (you pay in the car-park on the seaward side) but make sure you walk 300 yards north-east back towards the town to avoid the disused sewage pipe which is hidden at high tide! The water was fairly warm but the breeze was quite insistent so I didn't hang around long.

I have always prided myself on being fairly philosophical about the weather - any other attitude is folly if you live in Wales - but I have to admit my patience has been sorely tried this summer.

However, last year after an almost equally pants high season we did get an Indian summer (I should say Haf Bach Mihangel - "St Michael's Little Summer" - the archangel's saint's day being 29 September) with record-breaking high temperatures and consequently pleasant swimming opportunities into early October (see the evidence here).

So don't put away your Speedos (or Peter Hahn bikini) - the best may yet be to come!

Ultracool

Glorious pictures from the garden party held yesterday at Hafal's Trin Hyder project - congratulations to the planners for picking the nicest day of the year so far.

Meanwhile we have posted our response to the Welsh Government's draft mental health Strategy on-line. There was massive support for our User and Carer Panel's campaign on the Strategy and that forms the main message in our formal response presented jointly with the Mental Health Foundation and Bipolar UK: take a look here.

Two specific points made by patients and families are worth highlighting from the whole consultation process...

• We must protect resources for secondary mental health services which require major improvement and must remain the first priority.

• The Standards and actions detailed in the National Service Framework (NSF) and Action Plan for Wales published in 2005 provided clear instruction and direction to service planners and providers on the standard and type of services that needed to be delivered, and it is essential that this is not lost in the roll out of the new Strategy. A clear message needs to be given in the Strategy that the actions required in the NSF and Action Plan must continue and not be abandoned, except as and when specific new outcome-based targets are developed which equal or improve on each of the NSF standards. Such new targets cannot all be developed for inclusion in the Delivery Plan because of the likely tight timescale.

This last point is vital. The Strategy is a slight document for all that there is much good in it. We mustn't give the senior managers of mental health services a message that the Strategy - or even the Delivery Plan - tells them all they need to do! It will take time to replace the old NSF and Action Plan with something as detailed and robust (and, of course, better, we trust and expect).




Postscript:

I had decided to leave the Olympics alone rather than get caught up in the great tide of cynicism - sorry, I mean "patriotic fervour" - sweeping the nation. I haven't watched any of it so far but there are nuggets of interest to be found in the newspaper. I see that the UK Government is wondering how to use the Olympics to inspire a new generation of young people to take up sport, a tall order in view of all the hard work allegedly involved in becoming an elite athlete. The answer is to invite them to do the "Usain Bolt Olympic Quiz" as follows...

What is the right preparation on the night before defending your 200 metre Olympic championship? Is it:
(1) A bowl of wholemeal pasta, a glass of Lucozade, and an early night or
(2) Party until 3 a.m. with three members of the Swedish women's handball team

The correct answer is (2), ultracool Mr Bolt breezily reveals. Good gracious, even I would have taken sport more seriously if I'd known that...

Schlepping

While I'm schlepping around the Maes the Hafal microbus has arrived down the road in Barry bearing the Movin' On Up message.

The importance of early intervention in the treatment of serious mental illness - and the need for GPs to get up-to-speed in diagnosing mental illness - was one of the talking points.

Anne has been a full-time carer since giving up work for about two years. Speaking about her experiences of caring and mental health services in the Vale of Glamorgan Anne, who cares for her husband who has bipolar disorder, and her son, who has been given a diagnosis of psychosis, tells us: "My son's problems started six years ago when he was 16. Unfortunately his GP did not believe he had mental health problems, he thought it was simply a case of bad behaviour. I begged my GP to write to a psychiatrist but he refused. My son would go to the job centre for Jobseeker's Allowance and even they could see he had problems. Someone from the job centre phoned my son's GP and he said: ‘What's it got to do with you?'

"I tried to access support for my son via the local council. However, I was shocked to learn that he was too old for CAMHS services and too young to receive adult services. I could not believe that a loophole like this existed. I was batted back and for between child and adult services, I became very stressed and confused and almost fell ill myself. Since then I have had to fight to get services for my son. I had, for example, to push hard to get a Support Worker in place for him.

"I strongly believe that early intervention is crucial in the treatment of serious mental illness, that there should be an easy transition between children's and adult mental health services and that GPs should be brought up-to-speed on mental health issues, and that they are fully trained to see the signs and symptoms. It's crucial that GPs are au fait with mental illness as they are the first port of call for most people."

Thanks, Anne, that's a disturbing story and your suggested solutions make very good sense. Let me also point carers towards our Ten Point Plan here.