Visit to Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust

Our chief executive Daniel Elkeles recently visited Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust to see the progress being made in improving mental health care, learning disability and neurodiversity for the 1.7 million people who live in its patch.

Sussex feels like a microcosm of England: it has cities, large industrial areas (such as Gatwick), deprived coastal communities, rural areas and areas of affluence. All of which makes it a complex patch to provide tailored healthcare to so many different communities, while at the same time tackling many long-standing service, financial, workforce and cultural challenges.

They recently co-developed a new strategy with more than 3,000 people. Two things really stood out for me:

• commitments on suicides - to reduce to zero the number of suicides on inpatient wards, and to reduce by 20% the number of suicides in the community
• the trust’s values of compassion, accountability and optimism that shone through on my visit.

I heard how the last value doesn't means naively thinking everything is OK, but being realistic about challenges and holding hope for the future about the ability to continuously improve.

There's a strong link between homelessness and poor housing in contributing to mental health problems. The work they're leading to resolve housing issues was truly impressive. The trust has invested in a team of 12 housing specialists, who work with the multiple councils the trust serves to provide rapid support and intervention to find suitable accommodation.

In one part of their patch, where this has been particularly successful, the use of mental health services by the group of patients supported reduced by 60% when comparing the 12 months before and after receiving housing support. So, while the trust has been an outlier for the number of patients clinically ready for discharge, delays relating to housing have plummeted from over 800 a month in 2022 to fewer than 50 now.

They are also rightly proud of their discharge outreach recovery service, which supports people at home to both avoid admission and enable early discharge. It’s run by Venture People, jointly funded by West Sussex Council, the voluntary sector and the trust. The service:

• provides up to six weeks of care
• focuses on tackling social isolation
• helps patients get involved in activities in their local communities
• costs £80 per day per patient and is saving millions of pounds.

The leaders in the trust acknowledge there is more to do, but they can be proud of what they have achieved and of some impressive service innovation.

Thank you to Sean, Jane, Usman, Funmi, Oliver, Dan and the team for a super visit.