Community Development Workers (CDWs)
Many of the issues facing people with mental illness from black and minority ethnic groups (BME) are the same as for the white British community. Stigma, difficulties in everyday life such as problems with housing, being accepted by friends and family, finding or keeping work, are all issues that are commonly reported by those with mental health difficulties regardless of culture and background.
Members of BME communities and groups may experience difficulty getting access to, and engaging with mental health services, for a number of reasons. Community Development Workers are new workers whose job it is to build bridges between local mental health services and the BME communities they serve, and help communities to have more say in the sort of service they get.
Delivering Race Equality in Mental Health Care is the Department of Health’s five-year action plan for improving mental health services for Black and minority ethnic communities. It is based on three main building blocks: better, more culturally appropriate services; involving BME communities in planning and providing care; and better understanding the issues by using information and evidence. There is a huge amount of work going on to make DRE happen, finding ways that services can improve and sharing them more widely. For example, Community Development Workers (CDWs) were one of the ideas in DRE and there are now hundreds in post, with many more to come. Cornwall area got now team of four CDWs : Dean Harvey, Denis Alexander, Tamsin Dearing and Magda Machlarz based in Summercourt, and covering whole county.
The CDWs will be working with all BME groups, individuals, agencies and relevant steakholders. Helping, educating and contributing towards social inclusion in Cornwall.
Links for more: DRE info, DoH info
