From crisis management to prevention: How the Lambeth Living Well Collaborative is driving the transformation of mental health services

Objectives

The Collaborative comprises around 30 people, including commissioners, providers of health and social care services, service users and carers. It provides a platform for these stakeholders to come together to radically improve the outcomes experienced by people with severe and enduring mental health problems.

The Collaborative was informed by a vision that “the Lambeth Living Well Area will provide the context within which every citizen whatever their abilities or disabilities, can flourish, contribute to society and lead the life they want to lead.” This vision requires public services to understand that the wider determinants of health have the most significant impact on health outcomes. The Collaborative focuses on enabling people to build personal resilience and networks in order to minimise the occasions they suffer the detrimental impacts of crises. 

The Collaborative established in its first two workshops in 2010 that it would operate according to the following principles:

• Designing its new service offer on the principles of co-production where citizens and providers jointly design and deliver services.
• Use its collective power to ensure that access to universal services and facilities is enabled for all citizens who are diagnosed with a long-term condition or serious mental illness.
• Encourage the development of strong resilient communities in the geographic area designated as the Lambeth Living Well area.

The Collaborative is targeting the 4,000 people currently registered on the primary care SMI (serious mental illness) register within Lambeth’s 48 GP practices and about 2,000 people case-managed via Community Teams by the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust (SLaM).

Over the longer term, The Collaborative is striving to enable people with mental health and complex life problems to achieve the following ‘Big Three’ outcomes:

1. Recover & Stay Well: experience improved physical and mental health.
2. Choose: experience increased self-determination and autonomy.
3. Participate in daily life on an equal footing with others and specifically:
   - to 'connect' with family, friends, neighbours;
   - to 'give' in the community (eg community activities, volunteering, peer support);
   - to be included in society with reduced stigma and discrimination (especially in relation to mainstream services such as education, employment, and housing.