On Friday 28 June 2024, Dr Thomas Kitchen, Canopi’s Co-Director, spoke at the International Practitioner Health Summit.
The conference was co-organised by Canopi, NHS Practitioner Health and the Scottish Workforce Specialist Service around the theme of ‘a new hope for the future’.
The event covered a variety of topics from embracing neurodiversity to interventions and outcomes that have impacted workforce wellbeing.
Look to the past to find new hope for the future
Reflecting on the past to inform a hopeful future, Dr Kitchen suggested we should celebrate how far services like Canopi have come in promoting awareness and destigmatisation of mental health in the workplace.
Dr Kitchen said: “We haven’t fixed the problem but looking back at where we’ve come from should give us hope.”
Turning to the future, Dr Kitchen spoke about the importance of an integrated approach to supporting social care and NHS staff mental health.
Over a decade ago, services like Canopi were for almost exclusively for “doctors only”, often seeing only one or two people per week. With the support of Welsh Government and other organisations like Social Care Wales, Canopi now offers an integrated service.
Since April 2022, Canopi has received over 6,000 self-referrals made by social care and NHS staff across Wales.
Over 1,130 self-referrals were made by nurses and over 850 were made by people working in social care.
“Every one of these people has a story that is worth listening to – a story that we have to hear.” Dr Thomas Kitchen, Co-Director of Canopi
Working together – not apart
The expansion of Canopi came with careful considerations about what the needs of individuals might be. Were there differences in the needs across the sectors?
The evidence suggests that social care and NHS staff face many similar challenges:
Dr Kitchen added: “We found that the social care workforce shares similar needs and concerns: worry about disclosure, presenting with complex and often undermanaged mental health conditions which can be helped with short, early and cost-effective treatments.”
Integrated services like Canopi promote the idea of working together. They recognise the value of the individual and what they contribute to the caring system, irrespective of their employer.
Canopi is here if you need support with your mental health.
- To refer yourself or find out more, visit our About us page.