Opening 1 of the Mental Health Outreach and Social Inclusion Contract

This is re-opening of the existing framework for Outreach Support and Social Inclusion for People with Mental Health needs, to provide a range of options to support people to gain and retain the skills necessary to live as independently as possible and promote social inclusion. The Successful Provider will be expected to deliver the following support within this Lot, although the list is not exhaustive, and the Provider will be expected to support each Person in line with their individual needs and preferences:.

The level and intensity of the support will depend on individual needs of each person, and may include other forms of support, not listed below, to ensure each person's needs are met in a person-centered and flexible way:  Independent Living Skills - enable the Person to improve their skills to manage their day-to-day activities such as making telephone calls, dealing with correspondence, attending appointments and form-filling, keeping their home clean and dealing with laundry, managing shopping; encourage, motivate and support the Person to prepare and cook healthy meals safely; offer information, advice, and guidance on maintaining a personal hygiene routine.  Managing mental and physical health and self-care - understand the individual nature of each Person's experience of mental health and support the person to co-create a wellness recovery action plan (WRAP) or similar document, to outline their lived experiences as well as 'early warning signs' of relapse and how they would like professionals to respond to a mental health crisis.  Motivate the person to engage in activities and strategies to promote mental wellbeing - wide range of recommendations including increasing and decreasing social stimulation, mindfulness, distraction and grounding techniques, promoting sleep hygiene, promoting self-care routines, promoting medication concordance.  Budgeting, managing finances, tenancy and benefits - support the Person to take increasing responsibility for their budgeting, to ensure they live within their budget and advising them on how to manage their finances on a day-to-day basis, support them to manage their tenancy by abiding by the tenancy conditions and paying the rent, assist and enable the Person to claim and receive eligible benefits and deal with relevant agencies.  Social skills and social contacts - encourage and support the Person to develop social skills including but not limited to positive communication, social perceptiveness, conflict management, and anger management, encourage and help to motivate the Person to develop social contacts to reduce social isolation  Social inclusion and social navigation - support to access local community and make use of the community-based assets, expanding the Person's connectivity and building natural support networks and peer support.  Positive relationships - promote the importance of positive and healthy friendships, romantic, sexual, professional, and familial relationships; equipping he Person with the skills to effectively manage these and keep safe in a variety of settings.  Travel training - Travel training and guidance to improve confidence to use public transport.  Access to other services - Support to engage with and access other services and/or work in partnership with other agencies, in agreement with the individual, as part of the support planning process. This should be in culturally sensitive way to empower the Person to overcome perceived barriers and access mainstream health, treatment and recovery, housing, DWP, social care services and so on.  Employment, volunteering, education and training courses - encourage and support the Person to pursue and access employment, education and training courses.

Anyone looking to pursue employability pathways further should be referred to Work & Thrive Newcastle, the city's employment support partnership, led by Newcastle Council.  Leisure and participation activities - Offer practical support and encouragement to make use of leisure activities, engage the Person to place their voice, aspirations, and interests at the heart of service management and delivery.  Working in collaboration with the person around safeguarding concerns - involving the person in this process other than in exceptional situations. Crisis means a time of intense difficulty or danger, or when a difficult or important decision needs to be made; the support required is most likely to be linked with decline in mental or physical health, increase in behaviours that challenge, a hospital admission of a carer or a breakdown in formal or unpaid care arrangements.

This may include people who are open to an ongoing safeguarding investigation or are open to short term support from the health Crisis Team. The person's ability to cope or function is likely to be overwhelmed.

A crisis intervention will commonly include immediate actions to reduce risk of harm, engagement with the Person and people that matter in their lives, defining the problem, developing an action plan and evaluating success. Provider will deliver reactive intensive support to the person and may work alongside heath Crisis Team which will be responsible for responding to health-related issues (i.e. a relapse in the person's mental health disorder).

Such interventions will be time-limited but can be cyclical until such time as the crisis has resolved. The emphasis will be on helping the Person to identify their own solutions wherever possible and should be a partnership approach rather than taking control; although assertive and directive actions may be required, they should not endure for longer than in necessary.

Short term crisis support could include regular welfare checks, either doorstep, or telephone, and agreed escalation process will be required in case of a 'no response'. The crisis support Provider may need to work alongside the long-term support Provider if there is existing support from another Provider in place or increase intensity of the support provided already by their organisation.

In addition to the support described under the Life Skills Lot 1, the Provider delivering rehabilitation/recovery focussed support is expected to offer the following: A) A strength-based approach in a trauma informed way B) Support to build positive nurturing and therapeutic relationships C) Emotional support - listen, empathise, believe, respect D) Support to re-establish routines, regain control and set achievable goals E) Offer opportunity to talk about events and reflect on the Person's actions, to support learning from their behaviour and minimise chances of recurrence. F) Positive Behaviour Support Planning - Co-develop a positive behaviour support plan with the individual that identifies triggers and actions required to enable positive risk taking through reduced risks. G) Support to develop self-medication management routine H) When working with People transitioning from another service/hospital, the Provider will offer in-reach wraparound support, to start building rapport with the Person and to support successful transition.