Time to Talk Day 2022
Time to Talk Day is a significant date in the mental health calendar. Taking place on Thursday, 3 February 2022, it’s a national awareness day whereby friends, families, communities, and workplaces are encouraged to come together to talk about mental Health and how that affects personal wellbeing.
Here at Cwm Taf Morgannwg UHB we are encouraging staff to get involved in a way that feels right for them. That could mean a walk and talk with a colleague or having a chat over a cuppa with a friend.
Our wellbeing team have a full day of events planned to support them and to talk about their mental health.
During this significant week, we would like to remind our staff and communities of the Time to Change Wales pilot underway within our Health Board. CTM UHB was the first in Wales to launch a training module in 2021, aimed to reduce mental health stigma within healthcare settings.
Aimed at shaping future mental health training for healthcare staff, the module has been designed to equip staff to improve the lived experiences and outcomes for individuals affected by mental health across Cwm Taf Morgannwg by better identifying how, and where, experiences of mental health stigma can happen in the workplace. To book a place please use the link.
Time to Change Wales’ 2020 survey looked at the link between COVID-19 and mental health stigma. It highlighted healthcare settings as one of the key areas where stigma is experienced by people with mental health problems in Wales. (Stigma during COVID-19 survey, Time to Change Wales, June 2020.)
The anti-stigma campaign’s 2021 survey (with adults aged 16+ living in Wales) on Public Attitudes to Mental Illness also showed that 15% of those surveyed perceived a person as being treated unfairly by mental health professionals (an increase from 4% in 2019).
Mental health leads within our Health Board have acted upon this research and over the past few months have been working closely with Time to Change Wales to develop a series of films and training materials that highlight the experiences of people in Wales.
In these short videos, some of our mental health staff at Cwm Taf Morgannwg University Health Board speak passionately about why ending mental health stigma in healthcare is so important.
Dr Andrea Davies, Cwm Taf Morgannwg Project Lead and Consultant Clinical Psychologist and Systemic Psychotherapist said: “The past two years have impacted on us all and more than ever, we need to take care of each other and ensure that people experiencing mental health difficulties are able to access the right support.
“By working in collaboration with Time to Change Wales, we (Cwm Taf Morgannwg University Health Board) hope to effectively address stigma in health and social care settings. This is a tremendous opportunity to improve the experiences for those receiving and giving care across our region, as well as providing learning for our Health Board partners.
“By opening up a discussion around stigma, we hope to engage healthcare professionals in self-reflection and support them to take action around tackling stigma. Through this training, we want to empower and equip our staff to reflect on current practice and identify ways of improving experiences of patients with mental health issues in a non-judgemental way.
Our Health Board’s mental health services have contributed fully towards the training material and have proudly partnered with Time to Change Wales over its development. We have been hugely grateful for all the support provided by the national team.”
Ben Jeffreys, Programme Manager for Time to Change Wales said:"We are delighted to be partnering up with Cwm Taf Morgannwg University Health Board on this hugely important initiative to remove the mental health stigma in healthcare settings and to improve the overall patient experience across its services. Since emerging from the global coronavirus pandemic, tackling stigma is now more important than ever if we are to see a more compassionate and tolerant society in Wales.
“We hope our carefully-crafted training module will empower mental health staff to deliver its services free from stigma and judgement for a better patient experience. We will be working very closely with CTMUBH on evaluating the training module so that we can start to deliver this in health boards across the country.”
The training includes evaluation with delegates to measure the impact of the training and its effectiveness at improving patient and staff experiences across healthcare settings and services. The pilot module has also been extended to colleagues in Swansea Bay University Health board, and to date nearly 200 staff members working in clinical and non-clinical posts have attended.
When the pilot ends, staff feedback and an evaluation of the learning will be analysed before a final training module is established to roll-out more widely to all Health boards across Wales.