New mental health support for minority groups
The service will be aimed at people from south Asian, eastern European, African and Caribbean backgrounds
- Published
Two Bradford charities have won a £4.5m NHS contract to deliver specialist mental health support for people from ethnic minorities.
Mental health charity Mind in Bradford and domestic abuse charity Staying Put will run the project across the Bradford and Craven districts.
Charity leaders said they aimed to tackle stigma about mental health and create "improved trust" in services.
They will help people with conditions such as anxiety, depression and bipolar disorder.
The service will be aimed at people from south Asian, eastern European, African and Caribbean backgrounds and will be based in community settings rather than hospitals.
One key area of focus will be supporting people being discharged from hospital into community mental health support settings as well as group and one-to-one support.
'Stigma'
The new service will be integrated into ones already offered by the NHS, which is expected to help people get easier access and the right support.
Helen Davey, chief executive at Mind in Bradford and Yasmin Khan, chief executive at Staying Put, said they aimed to improve "understanding and access to community-based mental health services".
Yasmin Khan, of charity Staying Put, said the initiative would improve trust in services
The contract was awarded by NHS West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board through the Bradford District and Craven Health and Care Partnership.
The partnership said research showed people from ethnically and culturally diverse communities were more likely to be diagnosed with mental health problems and were also more likely to experience a poor outcome from treatment.
It said this was compounded by other issues such as racism, migration and disproportionate representation in the criminal justice system.
Sasha Bhat, director for healthy minds at the partnership, said it was "crucial to acknowledge and understand the cultural nuances that impact an individual's mental health".
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