Category Archives: Writing & journalism

BMA Patient Information Awards for Mind and Miscarriage Association work

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I’m really chuffed to be able to share that both Mind and the Miscarriage Association received awards at the British Medical Association Patient Information Awards 2017 for information and that I researched and wrote.

The awards aim to ‘encourage excellence in the production and dissemination of accessible, well-designed and clinically balanced patient information’. They look for accessible information that is evidence-based and well researched. It’s also important that people with lived experience are involved in the production of the information. You can see all the award winners here.

Information for young people (for the Miscarriage Association)

The youth resources I researched and wrote for the Miscarriage Association were highly commended. They were also given a runner-up award in the special category for Young Adults. I was particularly pleased with this award as I managed the whole project, conducted the on and offline research with young people, developed recommendations and wrote the resources themselves. You can read more about the consultation process here.

It was reviewed by Dr. Hannah R Bridges of HB Health Comms Ltd who wrote:

‘Wow! This is a wonderful example how good consultation and understanding your audience can lead to great quality information! The Miscarriage Association has identified a need for materials to support young people, who have different experiences and support needs. The consultation, planning, and promotional plans show excellence in producing health information. This shows through in the end products – high quality and extremely well-tailored to the audience. The insight and thought that has gone into this is commendable. Take for example the ‘what happens when you call our helpline’ page – simple, highly visual, concise and reassuring information to encourage young people in need of support to dare to pick up the phone – the overall impression is one of kindness. Just wonderful.’

Money and mental health (for Mind)

The information product Money and mental health I wrote for Mind was highly commended. It also received a runner-up award in the special category for Self-Care resources. This resource was one of the first to be written in a new ‘hub’ format. It involved research with Mind’s online community and social media audiences, working with bloggers with lived experience and researching common problems and support options.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t attend the awards with colleagues from either charity  – at 39 weeks pregnant it wasn’t worth the risk of going into labour on the train from Bristol, at the awards or in my brother’s shared house. But it’s a lovely way to leave work for a while.

Published in The Recovery Letters

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Last year, James Withney of The Recovery Letters emailed to see if I would be interested in contributing a letter to the published anthology. The Recovery Letters are addressed to people experiencing depression. They share experiences and give friendship and hope for recovery.

I’ve always believed in letters and writing as a way through difficult times. In 2012 I wrote about the benefits of public and private writing, on and offline. In 2013 I wrote about creative letter writing for self-guidance and managing mental health and in my post ‘Understanding mental trickery, notes from depression island‘ I used islands as a metaphor for the concept of depression being such that it’s often hard to remember you’ve ever felt happy or imagine you’ll ever feel better. And when you’re not experiencing it, it’s hard to understand or even remember how it feels.  I introduced the idea of finding and making connections between a happier mind and a depressed one. These messages don’t always have to be words. But it’s this idea that forms the basis of my recovery letter.

The book is published next week. I got my copy yesterday. There are some wonderful messages from people prepared to open up and be vulnerable, to share their experience to help others.

And I’m also chuffed to report that mine is the very first letter in the book – and that is has been selected as one of 12 letters that will be on display at the 2017 Mental Wealth Festival.

Understanding eating problems – updated Mind resource

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I don’t usually blog about individual Mind booklets and online resources I write or update (you can see the list here).

But my most recently completed product is pretty close to my heart. It’s called Understanding eating problems.

Changes and updates

I’ve tried to emphasise that you can find eating problems incredibly difficult to live with, without necessarily having a diagnosed eating disorder. I also wanted to make sure it was clear that you can have an eating problem or disorder without being noticeably over or underweight – and that you shouldn’t need a certain BMI or a particular diagnosis to access treatment. It was important to make sure the information was accessible and useful to everyone – including men and older women. These are both groups who are affected by eating problems but often less able to speak about their experiences and access treatment. I also tried to include blogs and quotes from lots of different people, about a range of experiences and problems.

It wanted to talk about the fact that even thinking about recovery can be scary. Eating problems can feel safe – and even exhilarating. Despite an eating problem making your life difficult, you may not feel ready to try and recover straight away. On top of this, I wanted to expand the information we provide on coping with recovery – dealing with food and eating every day in an on and offline world that can seem to spin around eating, food, weight, appearance and body image (you can read more about my own experience here). Sometimes you can look healthier physically, while mentally you’re actually feeling a lot worse. Recovery can take a long time and relapse is common.

The Information Standard

All Mind products are written to the Information Standard. This means that a first draft was reviewed by a number of people with personal and professional experience of eating problems. I love this stage of the writing process as it always gives you new things to think about, and opens my eyes areas I may not have considered or covered properly. We also make sure we consider and respond to all the feedback we receive – I’m looking forward to reading this too (whether it’s positive, negative or suggestions for improvement).

NICE recently updated their guidance around the recognition and treatment of eating disorders. These changes were reflected in the update too.

5 star review for Miscarriage Association training materials in RCOG’s journal (TOG)

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Learning materials for health professionals

I was really chuffed to hear that the Miscarriage Association learning materials for health professionals were given a 5* review in the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists’ journal The Obstetrician & Gynaecologist (TOG). I did a lot of work on these resources and it’s brilliant to get such positive feedback. Can’t say it better than Kath Evans from NHS England who partially funded the resources…

 

Writing to the Information Standard for Mind and the British Lung Foundation

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screenshot-2016-11-23-19-14-26If the events of 2016 have told us anything, it’s that people can write any old rubbish and post it online as fact. And people will believe them. Especially if those people are vulnerable or anxious.

And no one is more vulnerable or anxious than when it comes to researching health concerns. The internet is our first port of call for any worry – but news articles can leave us feeling confused and worried about what research shows and evidence recommends. I wrote about this in relation to antidepressants in pregnancy here.

Hundreds of other articles identify our most vulnerable moments and use them to drive traffic to their advert loaded pages.  If you’re struggling to conceive it’s hard to avoid clicking on an article entitled ‘Trying to get pregnant – 10 proven sperm killers!’

On the same search results page I found ‘10 things to do if you want to conceive’ and ’10 myths about trying to conceive’. They were basically the same and no one was any the wiser.

Reliable, balanced, current and evidence based information

The Information Standards recommended search hierarchy.

The Information Standard’s recommended search hierarchy.

It’s really important that people have access to reliable, balanced, current and evidence-based health information. Which is where the Information Standard comes in. Any organisation achieving the Information Standard has undergone a rigorous assessment to check that their information production process generates high quality, evidence-based, balanced, user-led, clear and accurate quality information.
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Strong, powerful, upsetting, thought provoking and with important teaching points – developing Miscarriage Association learning resources for health professionals

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Sorry about the picture on the left....

Sorry about the picture…noone wants Trump on their blog…

Skimming through the British Medical Journal, I came across a blog called Breaking bad news in maternity care. It’s a lovely piece about the new learning resources I worked on with the Miscarriage Association.

I coordinated the development of these resources, working with the National Director of the Miscarriage Association, the Media Trust and lots of service users and health professionals. Mary Higgins describes them as strong, powerful, upsetting and thought provoking with important learning points. I’m pretty pleased with that.

The resources are online now although we’re not launching them officially until the new Miscarriage Association website is live. But it’s great to see that health professionals are finding them useful already.

There are six films  – one each for ambulance crews, A&E staff, GPs and booking in staff supporting women with pregnancy loss and two for anyone talking to women about management of miscarriage and what happens to the remains of their baby.  Each one is accompanied by a good practice guide.

Research

  • I created a short survey for women and their partners. It asked them the top three things they would like to tell the relevant health professional about their care – and had a free text box too. In the BMJ blog Mary Higgins writes ‘what I say will be remembered for the rest of their life’. And it’s true. Most women who responded remembered exactly what they were told – good or bad – even after 10 or 15 years. It’s so important to get it right.
  • I also surveyed health professionals to find out what they and their colleagues found hardest about these situations and where they would like more training.
  • I wrote a report on each of these six areas, identifying key learning points and pulling out quotes and experiences we should highlight.

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Writing a blog about your mental health – why and how?

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Blogging about my mental health

A few weeks ago had an internet date. Of sorts. Not a romantic first date (thank goodness) but a face-to-face meeting with someone I met online. Someone like me in lots of ways. Someone who could be a friend.

We knew a lot about each other’s vulnerabilities and fears before we set eyes on each other. And that made things much easier. The conversation could get right to the good stuff. We could be open and honest. We chatted about medication, work, diagnoses, panic attacks, weddings and how our dogs help with our mental health. Not really first date fodder.

social anxiety blogIt’s all down to our blogs. Claire writes WE’Re AlL mAd HeRe about social anxiety (she’s also been asked to write a book about anxiety based on her blog – wow). She got in touch a few months ago and suggested lunch. I’m so glad she did. Meeting inspiring new people is just one of the things that blogging has done for me.

I’ve had a number of  readers get in touch with me recently about starting a mental health blog – overcoming those demons of uncertainty that whisper ‘what’s the point, who cares what I have to say?’

I know the feeling – I have it about writing fiction. But I thought I’d share a little about what blogging has done for me – and a few things that helped me get started.
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New youth resources for the Miscarriage Association

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“People said it was lucky really. I don’t know how to deal with that”

This quote was one of many we gathered from young women we spoke to during the youth young girl with bookproject consultation process I ran for the Miscarriage Association. It highlighted the need for additional support resources that  reflected the experiences of younger people.

Young women told us about dealing with miscarriage after an unplanned pregnancy, finding themselves isolated and unable to speak to parents or partners, turning only to friends for support and experiencing difficult reactions from hospital and nursing staff.

And now I’m excited to help the Miscarriage Association launch the resources we developed as a result.

A soft launch at Primary Care 2015

It sMA stall at Primary Careeemed appropriate to soft launch the resources at the Primary Care conference in Birmingham. It was here, last year, that community midwives and school nurses asked for more specialist resources for younger women. The Miscarriage Association’s National Director Ruth, some wonderful volunteers and I spent two days spreading the word about the Miscarriage Association and sharing our new resources.

They were universally well received and we sent boxes worth of leaflets out into the world as well as showing our new films (created for us by Rob Mitchell of MadCutta films) and chatting to anyone who would listen about what we were up to. It was wonderful to see how many people benefitted from the work the Miscarriage Association does – professionally but also in some cases personally.
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Running for Sane – Christie’s story

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Exercise for mental health

I’ve been thinking a lot about sport, and running for mental health recently. This is partly due toChristies just giving page work – I’m involved in the development of Mind’s Get Set To Go programme through the Elefriends community. I’ve also written a number of posts for New Level on the benefits of exercise for mental health and wellbeing.

There’s a strong personal connection too. Exercise is a vital tool for managing my own depression and anxiety. Recently I’ve been struggling to balance my mental health needs against the need to rest and recover after physical injury (darn knees!).

It feels as if more and more people are running. There’s definitely more people out and about in the parks and along the canals. This spring and summer has seen thousands of running events across the UK. One of the best things about these events is that each one is full of people pushing themselves for charities that mean a lot to them.

Christie’s story

One of these runners is Christie Plumb. She’s running the British 10k for Sane after losing her Sane logoMum when she was 11. Christie told me she felt that the stigma surrounding mental health problems and a lack of support contributed to her mother’s death. The work of charities like Sane and Mind are helping to reduce that stigma and provide support to those who need it.

Fundraising has helped her to open up about her mum’s death, to talk about it and give people ways to support her.

But Christie has found that running has helped her too. She said that before her boyfriend suggested the NHS Couch to 5k she was convinced that running was “impossible, physically impossible for me”. But she stuck at it and found it was helping with her own anxiety, clearing her mind and improving her confidence.

I really identified with the way she described running her way out of very strong feelings of anxiety and panic.

“Within the first mile, my chest loosens up and I’m not shaking any more. It’s incredible…before the Couch to 5k I had never got past that first barrier. Now I always carry on and push through. In a way it’s an analogy for pushing through anxiety and depression. You just have to keep going, even if it feels like you can’t. You’ll get there in the end.”

In running she has found a way to honour the memory of her Mum, to talk openly about her loss to people around her, to support a charity that means a lot to her and to look after her own mental health. To sponsor her, take a look at her JustGiving page here. To have a go at Couch to 5k yourself, take a look at this page. Who knows where it might lead.