Meet the NHS mental health team saving lives by helping people get and keep jobs they love
A team at one of the region's mental health NHS trusts has spent five years supporting people with mental health difficulties into fulfilling jobs - and helping to save their lives while they're at it
by Sam Volpe · ChronicleLiveA top NHS team has spoken about how helping people into work can help save lives.
The award-winning Individual Placement Support (IPS) team at the Cumbria, Northumberland, Tyne and Wear NHS Trust supports those receiving mental health care to either find or keep jobs. The idea for the service came five years ago and builds on research which highlights the link between struggles finding - or at - work and thinking about suicide.
Speaking ahead of World Mental Health Day, John Bolland, who runs the service, said it was no exaggeration to suggest this work was saving lives. He told ChronicleLive: "People will often say they know how the NHS saves lives with ambulances - what we are doing is trying to save lives over the longer term. How we do that is by helping people to get jobs they love and feel safe and supported in. We are not a blue light service but we do save lives in a different way.
"We set the service up five years ago. We know that the North East has such high suicide rates and what we realised was that if people were not able to get or keep jobs, that had a big influence on suicidal ideation. It's about people having purpose and meaning in their lives."
A fifty-strong team now works across the trust's huge geographical footprint. The idea is they link in with the teams offering clinical support to mental health patients and where a patient expresses a desire to get into and stay in employment, they then begin working with them and crucically with employers to make that happen.
Aimie Coburn, who leads the team in Newcastle and Gateshead, explained how things work. She said they worked with patients on a one-to-one basis to support them to identify what they want and need from employment, which could be ensuring it fits around family commitments, for example:
But it does not stop there. She added: We willl go out out and approach employers one-on-one to speak about their business and how they could support someone. We know that the first three to six months in a job role are crucial so we will work with employers to help with things like making reasonable adjustments and helping to make sure they are doing their bit to support a person."
John, Aimie and IPS employment specialist Sarah Wallace explained that while the concept of their work flew under the radar, when employers learned more about what they did, the reaction was positive. Sarah explained how on a day-to-day basis they were looking
They also added that, it is often a misconception that the service only works with those seeking entry-level jobs. John said that the team worked with around a 1,000 people a year, and that they could range across the employment spectrum - including support for people in high-powered roles such as surgeons.
Find out more about the IPS team here. October 10 is World Mental Health Day - this year the theme is supporting mental health in the workplace. Find out more here.
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