researchintorecovery.com - Section for Recovery at the Institute of Psychiatry

Masterclasses...

The following masterclasses were held from 9am until 12 noon on Monday 20th September 2010.

Facilitator	Masterclass Title	Description
Ruth Chandler and Mark Hayward	Who owns recovery?	This workshop will put a question mark over who owns recovery as an invitation for critical discussion with workshop delegates. It is something of an understatement to suggest that recovery has caught on both politically and corporately. This has resulted in much suspicion from Service Users and Carers about professional hijacking of recovery and/or recovery as the latest thing 'services do to people' There are good grounds for this suspicion. Recovery emerges from service user and survivor movements and is first and foremost about recovering or discovering quality of life as defined by the person in recovery. It is simply not enough to re-brand services as recovery orientated while the same problems continue to circulate. In the context of reclaiming power from an unequal starting point, prioritizing Service User and Carer ownership of recovery is a vital and very necessary counterbalance. How far does foregrounding Service User and Carer ownership move us on from the them/us divisions that disempowered clients to begin with? Have the goalposts simply moved, dressing the same unhelpful constructions of self and other under Service User and Carer clothes? What if service providers lived up to the promise of recovery-orientated practice and delivered services accordingly? Would this make it possible to think about recovery on an and/both continuum of shared humanity? In principle, this could not exclude mental health professionals simply because they are professionals. The facilitators will draw on their own experiences of working together and with others to offer up examples of collaborative recovery oriented practice within a range of settings; learning by doing in the training of mental health professionals, shared training and writing projects, involvement in research and community engagement. Can the goalposts change, requiring all collaborators to be hospitable to difference rather than feel threatened by it. Would this imply shared ownership of recovery? Delegates are invited to contribute to this thorny question of ownership by bringing practical examples into the workshop discussion.
John Moody & Lesley Smith	Implementing a peer support worker scheme	This master class will be based on learning arising from the recent Evaluation of the Delivering for Mental Health Peer Support Worker Pilot Scheme in Scotland. We will explore the impact that formalised peer support working can have on the peer workers themselves and the wider mental health service system. Participants will be invited to explore the key challenges of the process of implementation at national and local levels, reflecting on their own experiences and aspirations. Participants will also explore the potential for the application of the Scottish Recovery Network’s Employment of Peer Support Worker Guidelines which have been produced to support innovative, efficient, effective and fair peer support working in modern mental health services.
Larry Davidson	Barriers to a recovery orientation	This master class will identify and address the most common barriers practitioners and researchers have encountered in attempting to understand and implement a recovery orientation in their work. Primary among these is the division of labour regarding the notions of recovery, which is the responsibility of the person with the disorder, and recovery-oriented practice, which is the responsibility of the mental health practitioner. More specific barriers in each of these domains will be examined, and strategies will be posed for their overcoming in practice.
Marianne Farkas	Recovery and organisations: Changing cultures, process and capacity	In order for the vision of recovery to become a driver for services and systems, its implication have to be embedded in the culture, process and capacity of an organization. While recovery values, principles and orientation are universal, approaches to implementing a recovery orientation within a service vary from culture to culture. The masterclass will review the values of recovery and ways in which they can be expressed through different organizational structures and functions. The role of individuals with lived experience and those without lived experience will be discussed in the context of creating and maintaining change within an organization. Examples will be presented of different approaches to implementing a recovery oriented approach in an organization from different parts of the world.
Dianne Rose & John Larsen	User-led research and recovery	The masterclass will have two key learning objectives. 1: To provide insight into key principles of service-user research in mental health 2: To engage workshop participants in critical reflection on the value of service-user research in respect to recovery. This masterclass is challenging such concerns that some people have to the idea of user-led research in mental health. There are lots of ways in which people with lived experience can make important contributions to mental health research. They know only too well how it feels to experience mental health problems and to be a psychiatric patient – and they are sensitive to what it means being approached to take part in research. This is all crucial knowledge to inform the research design. The masterclass will use a combination of presentation and small group work in an interactive and collaborative approach to learning. Participants will be asked to actively contribute personal experiences, insights and views to maximise experiential learning and practice change as an outcome. In preparation for the course participants are encouraged to familiarise themselves with the following resources: information on SURE (http://www.iop.kcl.ac.uk/departments/?locator=300) and the research report ‘Getting back into the world’ (download here: www.rethink.org/intotheworld). The masterclass is aimed at researchers, service users and clinicians who are interested in discussing the value and possibility of service-user research and its impact on recovery.
Lindsay Oades	Well-being and recovery	This masterclass will explore the parallels between (a) personal recovery and concepts in wellbeing drawn from positive psychology; and (b) recovery oriented service provision and positive organisational scholarship. The "focus of recovery" model will be outlined to allow discussion of whether services are emphasing approach or avoidance goals within practice- and the relationship to wellbeing. The LifeJET protocols (Camera, Compass, MAP) used within the Collaborative Recovery Model and Flourish programs will be introduced. Participants will be encouraged to clarify personal strengths, values and identify approach goals and develop evidence based action plans. Examples of community and inpatient facilities using these approaches in Australia and Canada will be outlined. Participants will be asked to explore strengths and limitations in use of such approaches in different contexts.
Julie Repper	Developing recovery values in the mental health workforce	Most people involved in the provision of mental health services came into the field with the intention of supporting people with mental health problems towards a form of Recovery and around 40% have their own experience of mental health problems. Yet traditionally they have not been encouraged to draw on this experience; much of their training and professional socialisation emphasises the difference between ‘us’ - the professional experts (who can name symptoms, make diagnoses and treat symptoms) - and ‘them’ - the passive recipients of services. If we are to develop Recovery focussed values within the workforce, we must all draw on our own experiences of Recovery (from the adverse life events that we have all experienced) reflect on what helped and hindered us, how we coped and how we have moved forwards. This begins the process of breaking down barriers between ‘us’ and ‘them’. Together with personal narratives of people with lived experience of Recovery, it inspires staff to believe in Recovery, to understand how it differs from current paradigms, and to seek ways of promoting hope and Recovery in those with whom they work. This workshop will take participants through this process and present the work we have undertaken in our service to as a basis for considering what constitutes Recovery focussed values and how can we ensure that they inform our work.
Glenn Roberts & Elina Baker	Working as a recovery-oriented mental health professional	We all live and work with values, and in a context. I have been part of a growing interest in recovery-focused practice, practitioners and services in Devon for some years. This began with an independent group of ‘people of good will’ which became Recovery Devon and sponsored conferences, trainings and visits from guides and experts. These initiatives are leading to progressive and broad engagement from providers and practitioners with what it meant to ‘put recovery at the heart of all we do’ across the whole mental health and social care network. The workshop will explore developments to date, describe what has helped and the lessons learned. It will focus on the particular challenges for mental health professionals and the emerging implications of new forms and focus for practice.
Geoff Shepherd & Jed Boardman	Organisational transformation towards recovery	This masterclass will describe a new project commissioned from the Sainsbury Centre by the Department of Health, the National Mental Health Development Unit (NMHDU) and the mental health network of the NHS Confederation. The project aims to ‘field test’ a framework for helping local mental health services and their partners to become more recovery-oriented in their organisation and practices. A group of sites will be selected and will receive expert consultancy and advice, plus training input for service users, practitioners and managers where appropriate. The project team consists of Rachel Perkins, Julie Repper, Jed Boardman and Geoff Shepherd and is expected to run for 2-3 years, beginning in May 2010. The methodology has been developed by the Sainsbury Centre and is summarised in ‘Implementing Recovery – A methodology for organisational change’ (www.scmh.org.uk). The masterclass will cover the conceptual background and rationale for the approach and will focus on the organisational change agenda implied by attempts to help local services become more supportive of the recovery journeys of the people using them.