Psychological Therapies for people with Serious Mental Illnesses Clinical Network

The SMI clinical network is being created in response to a government directive which calls for the increase of availability for psychological therapies for people with serious mental illnesses (SMI’s). The illnesses currently under focus are personality disorders, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and psychosis.

Recently, pilot studies to plot the current availability of psychological therapies for these SMI’s have been undertaken across the country and the result are at present being collated. NHS England will then draw up the framework for the change to take place. It is expected that the pilot will highlight gaps in services that need to be filled and current training and staffing needs. Money has been allocated from government resources for this expansion and as a start; psychological therapies training is being made available to the CMHT’s for the first time.

The purpose of the SMI network is to look at the needs of people with SMI’s in the East of England region and drive the direction of change that will be needed to accomplish the directive. It is envisaged that a small sub group will also be created from the main group to look at the quality of training and to promote the delivery of courses that are needed for this group of people, such as DBT for personality disorders for example.

We are aiming to create the network with participants from all the East of England CMHT’s and the directors and senior staff from psychology in secondary care services, plus anyone who may have input into delivering therapy to people with SMI’s such as Eastern universities and HEE. It will also be important to have GP and CCG representation.

The inaugural meeting of the network will take place on June 21^st 2019 at the Hallmark hotel in Cambridge which we would like to invite you to.

Registration will be from 0930 for a 1000 start.

Questions about this event?

Name: Becky Wright

Email:becky.wright5@nhs.net

Telephone:0113 825 2666