This week our CEO, Sue Bell OBE was invited to talk at The Mental Health Services Conference 2022 hosted by Government Events. The conference focused on the latest updates from leading mental health service providers across the public and voluntary sectors.

10 million people are in need of new or additional mental health support as a direct result of Covid, according to the Centre for Mental Health. To ensure all those struggling with their mental health are receiving the right care, it is more important than ever for mental health service providers to find ways to improve and collaborate.

Change and best practices headlined the conference, with all speakers sharing insight from their own organisations.

Sue spoke to front-line peers about her experiences while leading 15-years of child-centred mental health services at Kids Inspire. She started by addressing the audience as trusted adults alike, saying that:

“the life choices we make and how they ultimately nourish our soul and build the bedrock of our lives are all essential to knowing that we can be trusted adults able to put a child at the centre when we are creating services.”

She went on to say that:

“Now more than ever, post-Brexit, lockdown and with all that we are experiencing with Ukraine, we really do need to deep dive into change with our services and within ourselves.”

Later on, speakers from other mental health service providers spoke about the challenges around the workforce. Including the capacity, expertise, training, recruitment, development and retention of specialist teams. While another touched on the need for a systemic public health response to work with communities and the need to invest in prevention and early intervention to avoid the unmanageable.

Headline stats relating to mental health needs in the UK:

• 1 in 6 people report experiencing a common mental health problem (like anxiety and depression) in any given week in England

• 41 million people were in contact with mental health services at the end of April 2021, with the majority of these (974,968) in contact with adult services

• In early 2021, rates of depressive symptoms for adults aged 16 to 39 years were more than double when compared with before the pandemic

• Two-fifths of patients waiting for mental health treatment contact emergency or crisis services, with one in nine (11%) ending up in A&E.