Citizens' Panel - Supporting emotional health and wellbeing in the borough

One of the Council’s responsibilities is to protect and improve the mental health and wellbeing of our residents and their communities. We asked for your feedback on:

• Your current emotional wellbeing
• What factors impacts on this, both positively and negatively
• What you do to support your own wellbeing
• Knowledge and experience of mental health services
• What you would like to see more of in the community, and
• What you would like to see included in a digital mental health resource.

Learning about your emotional wellbeing and mental health experiences helps us to shape our services to better meet your emotional wellbeing needs and those of your loved ones.

We recieved 324 responses to this, the demographics of respondents were:

• 60 per cent female, 39 per cent male
• 76 per cent White, 22 per cent Black, Asian or Multi-ethnic
• 10 per cent 18-24 year olds, 46 per cent 35-59, 42 percent 60 and over

Emotional health and wellbeing: ​Almost half (47 per cent) of respondents stated they had felt anxious to some extent over the preceding two weeks (providing a score of 5 or above). 40 per cent stated they had felt low/depressed. Factors that had the most positive impact on respondents’ emotional health and wellbeing were their relationships with friends/family and their home. Physical health and financial situation were the factors that had the most negative impact.​

Activities to support wellbeing​: The most popular activities undertaken by respondents were ‘going for a walk/other physical activity’ (79 per cent) and ‘spending time with family and friends’ (69 per cent).​ Almost two thirds (64 per cent) of respondents reported that they either ‘mostly’ or ‘always’ managed to undertake 30 minutes of moderate activity five times a week. Sixteen per cent reported that they ‘never’ or ‘almost never’ managed to do this. ​

Local facilities​: The majority of respondents reported having a GP surgery (84 per cent), park or open space (90 per cent), library (80 per cent) or sports/leisure facility (68 per cent) within a 15-minute walk from where they lived.​ Only 12 per cent reported having a family hub 15 minutes’ walk away. ​
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Mental Health Services​: Approximately half (51 per cent) of respondents stated they would know where to go for help if they (or a loved one) were having a mental health crisis, whilst 31 per cent felt there were not enough local mental health and wellbeing services available to meet their community’s needs. Of those who had accessed mental health services, over a quarter (26 per cent) reported finding it either ‘difficult’ or ‘very difficult’ to access the support they needed. Suggestions for improving access to mental health support included: more communication/ promotion, increasing services available and reducing waiting lists/times. ​

The services which respondents wanted to see more of within their community to support mental health and wellbeing were talking therapies (57 per cent) followed by culturally appropriate services to meet local needs (33 per cent). Information which respondents wanted to see included in a mental health digital resource were lists of local services (76 per cent), locations of local services (70 per cent) and NHS services available (62 per cent). 

Please note these are planned initiatives following the Panel survey, we will update Panel members on progress as a later date.

To develop our comprehensive mental health campaign (including mental health training) and an enhanced digital platform to include the learning from the Citizen’s Panel, we will:

• Utilise our community champions, community health and wellbeing workers, libraires and GPs to run a campaign for residents about how to manage anxiety​
• Promote services and health messages within the community with high footfall for men and younger residents including: gyms, pubs and barbers. ​
• Work with the Equalities Board and Kensington and Chelsea Social Council to develop culturally competent communications strategies.​
• Target our mental health training offer to local SME and VCS organisations​
• Promote the Cost of Living Hub and include links to debt advice support within the mental health digital platform and as a discussion point in the training programme. ​
• Review and update mental health services information and messages on Kensington and Chelsea website and KCNet.​
• Launch of the Children and Young People Mental Health and Wellbeing Campaign “You Got This”.

Enhance local mental health services​

• Work with our local account group and community champions to review pathways into mental health services​
• Utilise our VCS workforce to develop system wide culturally competent services​
• Upskill VCS organisations to deliver a range of culturally competent services​
• Review self-help and peer support offer available via Community Living Well Talking Therapies services​
• Commissioning Mental Health awareness and prevention training to VSOs and communities in RBKC to build community resilience.