HSC to offer more mental health support at Christmas and New Year

Friday 10 December 2021

The Committee for Health & Social Care is launching a new scheme to support people struggling with mental health during the festive season - between 20 December and 2 January.

The Committee says it recognises that the holiday season can be difficult for some people. Its temporary service - the first of its kind in the Bailiwick - is aimed at anyone who is feeling isolated or experiencing moderate levels of stress or distress over the Christmas and New Year holiday season.

The temporary scheme does not replace any existing mental health service. It is for anyone who feels they need additional support but who might not ordinarily either seek it or meet the clinical threshold for more acute support services. Anyone who requires support from the specialist secondary care mental health service should still seek referral through their GP.

Pictured: The Committee for Health & Social Care has outlined how its new temporary wellbeing service will operate over Christmas and New Year.

“In line with the Government Work Plan, the Committee has been working towards a pilot arrangement with the third sector for some drop-in out of hours support to be available on a pilot basis,” said Deputy Al Brouard, President of the Committee for Health & Social Care.

“While these arrangements are not yet in place, we know that Christmas can be a difficult time of the year for some islanders’ mental wellbeing. We wanted to increase our capacity over the festive period to help those who might be in need of additional wellbeing support.

"Our thinking here is particularly around people who might need some extra help but who wouldn’t necessarily meet the clinical threshold for more acute services and who would benefit from out of hours support.

“While this 'pilot of a pilot' won’t initially go as far as we intended, the Committee will build upon this further. Discussions surrounding a partnership approach with the third sector to provide out of hours drop-in crisis support also continue in parallel."

Pictured: Launching his Committee's new temporary Christmas and New Year scheme, Deputy Al Brouard said that he and his members are still working on plans for an out of hours crisis drop-in centre.

The temporary initiative has been welcomed by the Associate Director of Mental Health and Adult Disability, Fiona Robertson.

“We are always examining ways we can improve and broaden the support we offer the community,” she said.

“I would encourage anyone who is struggling during this coming Christmas period, who feels like they need some additional support and wants to speak to a mental health practitioner, to please make use of this temporary service. 

“We don’t want individuals experiencing unnecessary stress or distress. All of the professionals who work in mental health, do so because they truly care about people and want to help.”

Deputy Tina Bury, Vice-President of the Committee, said: "Recognising calls from the community to improve the support we offer islanders within mental health provision is something that is really important to the Committee and the States as a whole as highlighted in the Government Work Plan.

"Even though a small first step, we hope that this new temporary service will help people who are going through a difficult period. Isolation and loneliness can be heightened at this time of year so we hope that this accessible way of speaking to a mental health professional could really help anyone experiencing that."

The Committee recently published a summary report of a review of its mental health services which was carried out three years ago. In the summary, reviewer David Gedze said that mental health services in Guernsey were "in many ways...as good as or better than those in most countries in the world. The services are well resourced, providing a wide range of clinical interventions to meet the needs of the population."

The summary report drew criticism from some that the full report had not been published and led to calls for more political scrutiny of mental health services.