Shaping the future of mental health care

Selected Islanders were due to join States departments and community and voluntary sectors that have already contributed to Jersey’s Mental Health Review to help improve mental health services in the Island.

  • One in four people in Jersey will experience some kind of mental health problem each year.
  • Mixed anxiety and depression is the most common mental disorder in Britain.
  • Women are more likely to have been treated for a mental health problem than men.
  • About ten per cent of children have a mental health problem at any one time.
  • Depression affects one in five older people living in the community and two in five living in care homes.
  • British men are three times as likely as British women to die by suicide.
  • The UK has one of the highest rates of selfharm in Europe, at 400 per 100,000 population – Jersey’s reported rates are even higher.
  • Only one in ten prisoners has no mental disorder.

The purpose of the review is to produce a comprehensive mental health strategy for the future.

Work so far has involved looking at what services will be needed, such as early intervention, recovery and support as well as prevention and awareness.

Today’s event at the Radisson Blu Hotel, which was due to be attended by around 110 people, will enable these priorities to be developed further.

Assistant Health Minister Peter McLinton, who was expected to attend the event, said: ‘Detailed work and planning for the future regarding mental health services has been going on for nearly a year to ensure that the States of Jersey will be able to provide the best mental health services possible for Islanders.

‘Mental health remains a high priority for Health and Social Services.

‘We know that it is as important for people to be mentally healthy as it is to be physically healthy, and for people to be able to access the right mental health services for them when they need it, as quickly as possible.’

Assistant Health Minister Peter McLinton was due to attend the event

Last year, Mind Jersey released two films starring Islanders who have suffered from depression.

The charity released the films at a special premiere at Cineworld.

The purpose of the films is to highlight the condition, with the aim of increasing awareness and understanding about mental health, which affects one in four people in the UK.

In the films below, Mind Jersey ambassadors Beth Moore and Stephen Le Quesne speak openly and honestly about how depression affected them:

Mental health lawyer Peter Edwards speaking at Clarkson House

In 2014, a human rights lawyer from the UK claimed that Jersey’s mental health laws are ‘outdated and not fit for purpose’.

Peter Edwards was invited to the Island by Adult Mental Health Services to talk to social workers, psychiatrists, nurses and doctors about how to ensure the care they provide is compliant with the European Convention on Human Rights.

Speaking to the JEP during the event, he said: ‘Jersey must have a Mental Health Law which meets the minimum requirements of human rights legislation.

‘The Mental Health Law here is outdated and not fit for purpose.’

He also told frontline staff about plans in Jersey to introduce a Capacity Law which will give better legal protection to vulnerable Islanders. The law, which has existed in the UK since 2005, relates to vulnerable people with dementia, learning disabilities or those with mental illnesses who lack the capacity to make decisions about their care and treatment. If introduced, the law would enable patients – or those acting on their behalf – to have a greater say on their care and have more powers to challenge rulings on where they are placed.

‘There have been people who have effectively been parked in the system who haven’t had an outlet for their voice and there hasn’t been based on shaky legal foundations, it should cause me concern.’

  • Islanders with mental illnesses are supported by Mind Jersey.
  • The independent local charity aims to encourage Jersey to be an Island that promotes and protects good mental health for all, and that treats people with experience of mental illness fairly, positively and with respect.
  • Although affiliated with Mind in the UK, Mind Jersey retains its independence, both financially and operationally and all money raised stays in Jersey for the benefit of Island residents.
  • Mind Jersey was re-launched in June 2011, as the most recent stage in the evolution of the charity. The charity evolved from Jersey Focus on Mental Health, which in turn formed in 2002 when the Jersey Association of Mental Health (formed in 1969) and The Jersey Schizophrenia fellowship (formed in 1977), merged.
  • You can contact the charity by calling 0800 7359404 or emailing help@mindjersey.org
  • More information is available here
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