NELFT Waltham Forest were the first borough to launch the first Mental Health & Wellness Team (MH&WT) on the 1 of March 2022. The team leads Christopher Ashogba and Ishmael Osei-Owusu alongside the team manager Suzette Goodlitt, organised a launch celebration event for the team on the 8 of March 2022, to commend the team for their achievements. The Associate Medical Director and CMHT Programme’s clinical lead Dr Russell Razzaque was in attendance, and the Assistant Director for Waltham Forest Shurland Wilson did a short presentation highlighting the achievements and congratulating staff who worked tirelessly. There was also an opportunity for staff to share their thoughts on the lead up to the launch and what they hope to see in the future.

In the lead up to launch of the MH&WT across NELFT Waltham Forest, local authority partners, other partner organisations, and service user representatives met fortnightly over the course of the year to carefully plan the launch of the first team. Waltham Forest held their staff consultation between 28September 2021 – 12 November 2021, four staff consultation workshops were also organised during this period  as well as an opportunity for a one to one with staff on request. The overall outcome of the consultation was positive with no major challenges to the proposed changes from staff. Furthermore, in December 2021, Waltham Forest held their first virtual Patient Information workshop to inform patients in the areas affected of the upcoming changes and a chance to hear their thoughts and suggestions.

Since the launch of the MH&WT the team have welcomed five new Peer Support Workers to form as part of the team who were recruited via our partner organisation MIND. NELFT Waltham Forest are also collaborating with the organisation ‘With You’ who have been commissioned to support  and integrate the peer support workers in to the MH&WT. 'With You' organised a team away day called ‘Team Readiness’ on 18 April 2022 for the MH&WT and is in the process of securing allocation for training in the coming weeks. The team have regular team meetings every Tuesday morning and have also received group Trauma Informed Care (TIC) training on the 25 April 2022.

As part of the transformation NELFT Waltham Forest have also been working with the Primary Care Networks of GP’s in Waltham Forest and have recruited five Mental Health Practitioners who are based in the GP primary care settings across the borough.