The East Midlands Patient Safety Collaborative (PSC) is looking for people who have spent time receiving mental health inpatient services in the East Midlands, who would be happy to use their experiences to help improve local services.

We are inviting people who have spent some time in hospital, their carers and families, to work alongside us to help improve the quality of care for those using inpatient services.

Your role will evolve as the programme develops and could include the following:

• Contribute to service improvement by sharing your experience, views and guidance at meetings, networks, and events.
• Review reports, strategies, plans and material from a patient perspective and help produce accessible information for the public.
• Advise and advocate for others on how the programme can better serve groups and communities who experience comparatively poorer health outcomes.
• Advise how to reach wider views and/or advocating the perspectives of people, ensuring diversity of perspectives are heard.

People from all communities and backgrounds are welcome and a small participation payment and out-of-pocket expenses will be offered.

Although the programme is evolving, it is expected that participants will attend a monthly online meeting, between one and two hours long.

This public involvement invitation is part of the East Midlands PSC Mental Health Safety Improvement Programme, which is working with mental health services to make care as safe as possible for people who use services in a hospital setting. It aims to do this by focusing on three main areas:

• Reducing suicide and deliberate self-harm in inpatient settings, and the healthcare workforce.
• Reducing restrictive practice in inpatient mental health and learning disability services.
• Improving sexual safety in inpatient mental health and learning disability services.

Andy Willis, a member of the East Midlands Patient Public Involvement Senate, explains:

‘Restrictive practices and restraint can cause trauma, harm, and affect the dignity and emotional safety of service users and staff alike. It should always be a last resort, using the minimum of force required to ensure patient safety and, as a former service user once described to me from her co-production work on restrictive practice,  it should always be applied with a sense of professional calm.'

He goes on to say:

‘Co-production should be at the heart of this improvement, in a process where patient, carer and clinician voices are heard together, as lessons are learned to drive progress in both restraint practices and patient safety. As patients from black and minority ethnic communities are statistically more likely to experience the use of physical restraint, issues of equality should also be an important consideration in this initiative.’

If you, or someone you know, would like to join the team working on improving local services, please download:

Covering letter and role description here

Application form here

The closing date for applications is Sunday 4 July 2021.

For further information, contact Deborah Wilson on This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or 07773 610741, or Kay Khan on This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or 07971 798040.