Blog

How can NHS services use their facilities to better support social prescribing? Ben Collins highlights what’s needed to make NHS sites more welcoming spaces for individuals and communities.

Providing joined-up services that address people’s physical and mental health needs has long been a challenge. Jihad Malasi asks whether primary care networks could be the answer to providing holistic primary care mental health services.

Helen Gilburt reflects on the experiences of staff and people with mental health problems during the first months of Covid-19 and urges mental health services to learn from those experiences to plan for the future.

The Covid-19 outbreak has exposed gaps in psychosocial support for health care workers. Mary Docherty, Consultant Liaison Psychiatrist at King’s College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust London, considers the action needed to address those gaps and meet the needs of the workforce in the future.

A resilient health and care system is about more than national action. Sally Warren shares a vision for building local resilience that would allow the health and care system to respond effectively to future crises.

Much media attention has been paid to how acute services are tackling Covid-19, but what about community health and care services? Anna Charles considers the impact of the outbreak on these often overlooked services and the role they might play in the next phase of the response.

New standards aim to improve urgent care in the community, but how easily can they be delivered? Anna Charles considers how workforce, social care and the pace of change might pose challenges for implementing these welcome plans.

There is nothing to smile about in new statistics showing more people request social care support but fewer get it.

How reliable is the data collected about detentions under the Mental Health Act? Veena Raleigh looks at the data quality issues and their implications.

With the publication of the government’s Green Paper on child and adolescent mental health, Jill Roberts looks at how it tackles the issues around inequalities.

Building relationships is central to the success of work under way to enhance health in care homes. Susie Perks-Baker looks at how respecting each other’s skills and knowledge can help.

Veena Raleigh looks at the current debate around the slow-down in mortality improvements in England and Wales.

Can we reduce late-life dependency or plan for it better? David Oliver reflects on the findings of a recent Lancet paper and asks what we can do to tackle the challenges it highlights.

Chris Naylor considers whether public mental health is being prioritised in a world of thinly stretched public health budgets.

In this guest blog, speech and language therapist Joanne Fillingham makes the case for a stronger leadership role for allied health professionals (AHPs).

Quality improvement is not a quick fix, and creating the type of cultural change needed to adapt an organisation's whole approach to quality does take time, says Shilpa Ross.

Helen Gilburt explores the prominence of mental health in the Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrat manifestos.

Alongside the launch of our report on mental health and new models of care, Chris Naylor explores some of the benefits of investing in mental health.

David Buck explores whether machine learning can help find wider meaning in millions of unstructured online conversations about our health.

The extra £2 billion for adult social care announced in the Spring Budget will be gratefully received, but local councils now face tough choices about where to allocate the money. Richard Humphries considers the context.