Towards a lived experience model for Pathfinder West Sussex

All photos courtesy of Louise Patmore

Over 70 people attended LEAG’s lived experience conference at Field Place in Worthing for an inspiring day of interactive workshops, ideas generation and presentations. Bringing together people from different backgrounds and professions – from service managers and carers of people living with mental health problems to LEAG members and NHS staff – the event was an opportunity for diverse perspectives to reflect on the power of lived experience, what it means to individuals and service users, and how that voice can be best represented in co-produced services.

Expertly hosted by Alex from CAPITAL, the day began with a presentation about the history of the Lived Experience Advisory Group, which was originally commissioned by the NHS’s Integrated Care Board in 2022 to bring lived experience into Sussex’s community mental health transformation programme.

LEAG members reflected that the meetings they attended as part of the programme were a space in which they “really came into their own”, offering a reality check perspective to the design of new integrated mental health services and taking a ‘critical friend’ role. Crucially, they were involved from the outset of the programme and were subsequently involved in the design of new neighbourhood mental health teams across Sussex.

Delegates then enjoyed a series of presentations from key partners involved in Pathfinder West Sussex: from BHT Sussex and West Sussex Mind, which run Pathfinder’s county-wide adult mental health service; from Stonepillow, Crawley Open House and Turning Tides, which support people experiencing homelessness into accessing mental health support through Pathfinder; and from Southdown’s Individual Placement Support (IPS) service, which supports people who have experienced mental health problems to find meaningful paid employment.

Host Alex reflected that lived experience involvement “gives people the power back” and has a “profound impact on individuals, helping them transform themselves."

“It’s the work that keeps people well,” she said.

This latter point was beautifully illustrated in a talk from Eammon, one of BHT Pathfinder’s volunteer peer mentors, who spoke passionately about how supporting BHT Pathfinder clients has helped keep him focused during retirement and aided his recovery journey following his own difficulties with depression and anxiety.

Mixed groups took part in two engaging workshops during the day: the first exploring the conditions for lived experience involvement to flourish and the barriers to this; and a second one putting forward first ideas for shared principles, responsibilities and actions for Pathfinder West Sussex that will enable lived experience and co-production to flourish. The latter took the form of a “co-production tree” that groups contributed to, physically starting to build a model, and provided a colourful and engaging end to the day.

Big thanks to the LEAG and CAPITAL for hosting an inspiring and thoughtful event that helped people think differently and will provide a great starting point for new co-produced lived experience model to inform partners’ ways of working.