Hello all,
I joined the list before the holidays, but didn't have a great deal of time
to introduce myself to the list.
I qualified as a clinical psychologist in 2002, from the University of East
Anglia, Norwich. I am currently employed by Norfolk Mental Health Care NHS
Trust, within the adult mental health service in a seaside town in Norfolk.
I work within Psychological Therapies and Primary Care, and will be helping
to develop the new Primary Care Service within this locality. The
opportunity to be involved in the early stages of service development was
one of the aspects of this post that made it attractive to me.
I believe that local context is of great importance in understanding
people's experience of poor mental health. I work in an town that has a
particular set of strengths and problems (including some very good voluntary
sector organisations as well as high levels of socio-economic deprivation)
that are important to understand in planning mental health services and
mental health promotion. I worked at this part of the coast prior to
training, and also during two of my training placements, so I am beginning
to form an appreciation of some of the concerns of local people. I hope to
use my research skills and dedicated time in my post to develop this
understanding further.
I have recently conducted qualitative research into local people's
representations of mental health in a disadvantaged community (in a nearby
city), and hope to build upon this work to inform our local service
developments. I have personal experience of growing up under conditions of
financial hardship, and of the feelings of disconnection that can be
associated with emigration. These issues are meaningful to me, and inform my
choices about work that I do. I have an interest in the mental health needs
of refugees and asylum seekers, and the importance of connectedness, home,
and place in mental health. From a material-discursive perspective, I
consider the importance for mental health, of both the material conditions
of life and the socially constructed environment that people inhabit.
Within my research, I found more than just individual material and social
circumstances to be of importance in understanding mental health in a
community. It is important to understand how the community as a whole is
viewed by its members and relevant others. Representations of a community as
deprived, dangerous, hard to work with, and so on, are an additional layer
of stigma, which may contribute to distress, distrust, and feelings of
hopelessness and disempowerment within its members. Consequently, a focus on
interventions at this level can be important in promoting its members'
mental health.
The philosophies of community psychology may often take clinical
psychologists beyond our more familiar activities of direct and indirect
work focused upon individuals and families. As a newly qualified clinical
psychologist, with a relatively conventional clinical training, this will be
an interesting and challenging time for me. In addition to consolidating and
developing my core clinical skills, this will be a time of much (and
enthusiastically anticipated) learning and discovery. As a member of a
continually growing and developing profession, I hope this will be a
long-term trend throughout my career. I particularly embrace and appreciate
the opportunities that I have within a service that is open minded and
supports these kinds of developments.
I hope that this list will become a rich source of information and exchange.
Sadly, as many of us know, time in the NHS is often rather pressured, but I
will endeavour to keep up with the list and contribute when I can.
Best wishes,
Wendy
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Wendy Franks, Clinical Psychologist
Norfolk Mental Health Care NHS Trust
Admiralty House, Northgate Hospital, Gt. Yarmouth, NR30 1BU
(01493) 337715
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