Health Messaging with a difference!
As stated on the main RIC Health Messaging page this health message is a totally different ask from anything we have done before.
This health message is intended to build capacity and resilience in our valued VCS delivery providers staff teams and the organisation as a whole by enabling them to access Mental Health First Aid training.
We have all had a turbulent past two years, and with the increasing pressure from cost of living rises that will be with us for some time. The VCS Alliance and our commissioning partner, Bradford and Craven CCG, want to support our VCS delivery partners by giving members of their staff teams the tools to:
- Recognise stress indicators in themselves and fellow staff members and know how to help/ intervene.
- Recognise and feel confident in intervening when someone is in crisis.
- Understand what to say, how to say it and when to say it.
- Be able to understand and map their interventions against professional boundaries, that is, when does a situation call for a mental health professional e.g., counselling, etc.
- Recognise and understand the difference between Mental Health First Aid and Counselling.
- Understand appropriate potential referral routes.
- Feel confident and secure in supporting someone in need of a Mental Health First Aid intervention.
Over the foreseeable future it is almost certain that more and more of our communities are going to see an increase in poor mental health and wellbeing due to the pressures that will be felt in communities and families struggling to survive, potentially facing homelessness, unable to pay bills, choosing between heating and eating…
The VCS Alliance and our commissioning partner the Bradford District and Craven CCG see Mental Health First Aid as an opportunity to develop the necessary skills and understandings to support our community members through the most desperate of times.
This training may enable you to intervene in a situation before it becomes a mental health crisis and give those in need of this intervention hope and an understanding of how they can develop their own tools for better mental health and wellbeing.
What will this look like?
We are looking to provide Mental Health First Aid training for 9 VCS members of staff. The nature of these potential interventions means volunteers will only be considered in exceptional circumstances, this could be:
- A retired health care professional or a working health care professional that is volunteering in their free time.
- A retired social care professional or a working social care professional that is volunteering in their free time.
- A volunteer that has a proven history of volunteering in a mental health care setting or with a mental health support organisation such as MIND, Sharing Voices etc.
Training 9 people will mean that each of the 3 RIC areas will have 3 trained Mental Health First Aiders.
We would ask that projects that engage with this offer will use this training not only to undertake interventions when necessary but also to extend this support by:
- See health messaging as a part of their ongoing work that will compliment and supplement their offer.
- Plan in some mental health awareness work around how to recognise triggers and anxiety as a part of their ongoing delivery around physical and mental health interventions.
These are just examples and we do not expect any project to undertake work they are not funded to do, please remember this is primarily intended to build capacity in your organisation and enable you to support your service users with confidence. But any support you could offer to neighbouring projects around Mental Health First Aid will help us to build resilience across the sector.
To apply for this training all applicants must be based and operating in either:
- Community Partnership 4
- Community Partnership 5
- Community Partnership 6
What we are asking
Those project staff selected will attend 1 day of face to face training at a venue in Bradford to be announced.
- Those that undertake the training to keep a reflective journal for 1 month and be willing to share some of these reflections with us for reporting purposes. We would ask that all journals are anonymous. (this journal will be provided by The VCS Alliance).
- Journals would be light touch and used as a tool to understand your own journey from undertaking the training to making use of it with team members and/ or community members.
- To complete a mental health questionnaire before training, at the end of the observations period (4 weeks) and then a final one 1 month (approx) after the end of the delivery period.
- 1 anonymous case study of how this has helped you in your delivery .
Additional recompense
Please keep in mind this is meant to supplement your existing delivery and give your project an important tool to support your service users, you will not be asked to undertake any additional delivery work.
But, we do recognise that keeping a reflective journal, completing a case study and completing the questionnaires is an additional ask. A reflection could be a poem, a drawing… anything that you want that expresses that point in time for you… any of these things should only take a few minutes at the most.
To cover these small asks we are offering each project £300 on top of the training cost to cover this.
The total package is worth approximately £700 per staff member.
Important dates
- All training will be completed by September 26th 2022 at the very latest.
- Journal will be kept for 1 month from the 1st Oct 2022 – 1st November 2022.
- 1st questionnaire will be completed prior to the training
- 2nd questionnaire in the first week of November 2022
- 3rd questionnaire by 19th December 2022
- Case study submitted 1st week in November 2022
How to apply
Please visit the link below if you are interested in this training opportunity:
https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/RICHM-MentalHealthFirstAid
Please note:
This is not a normal application process, we are not asking you to detail a funding case, the form will simply ask you to confirm you are happy to complete, the journal, case study and questionnaires.
This is on a first come first serve basis and on the understanding that we will be offering places to 3 delivery staff members in each CP area. If we do not get 3 per area, we may offer additional spaces to the other Community partnerships.
