Off the top of your head podcast

Sarah McIntosh & The Launch of the Association of Mental Health First Aiders

• MHFA England

Share episode

Prepare to be inspired as Sarah McIntosh, a dedicated Mental Health First Aider from MHFA England, joins us on "Off the Top of Your Head" podcast.

Sarah’s journey reveals the power of opening up essential conversations about mental health and the profound benefits of a holistic approach in the workplace. 

Gain insights on strategic planning, policy implementation, and continuous support to foster a mentally healthy work environment.

This episode also marks a significant milestone with the launch of the Association of Mental Health First Aiders (AOMHFA). Discover the remarkable ways in which MHFAiders are challenging mental health stigma and transforming discourse across workplaces and society. 

With over half of these dedicated individuals utilising their skills weekly, resulting in millions of supportive conversations annually, the new association aims to enhance their impact even further. 

Dive into this thriving community, celebrate their achievements, and learn how you can be a part of amplifying their vital work. Don't miss out on this enlightening conversation and the opportunity to join a movement that's making a difference!

Introduction Voice Over:

Thank you.

Introduction Voice Over:

Understanding mental health in the workplace is changing. Join MHFA England's Chief Executive, simon Blake, and his guests as they shine a light on creating healthier workplaces and their impact in our wider communities. This is the Off the Top of your Head podcast.

Simon Blake:

Hello and welcome to this edition of Off the Top of your Head podcast, a podcast all about mental health and well-being in the workplace and beyond. My name's Simon Blake and I'm the Chief Executive of the social enterprise MHFA England, and this is my pleasure to welcome you to this special episode. Today I am joined by my colleague at MHFA England, sarah McIntosh. Sarah's here to talk to us about some exciting developments with our mental health first aid course, so I won't hold you up any further. Listen in, find out the news that we've got for you. So today I'm delighted to welcome Sarah McIntosh to the podcast to talk a little bit about mental health, first aid and some things that are coming up. But, sarah, do you want to introduce yourself?

Sarah McIntosh:

Yeah, of course I am Sarah McIntosh. I work for Mental Health First Aid England. I've been a mental health first aider since 2016. I think so way before I joined the organisation in my previous workplace.

Simon Blake:

And what was the most important or most useful or most helpful thing that you remember learning when you first did the mental health first aid course?

Sarah McIntosh:

So I remember going onto the course and knowing that it was a really popular course and lots of my network were talking about it. So when we got the opportunity to do it in my previous workplace I really wanted to join the course and experience it. I perhaps didn't know exactly what to expect, so when I got there it was quite an intense course, but in a really good way. So I learnt lots of information about what mental health, what good mental health, what mental ill health looks like. We had lots of great conversations around the different causes of mental ill health and some of the reasons why some people may have a higher level of prevalence to mental ill health as well, and we spent a lot of time looking at different mental health conditions so that we could get familiar with being able to spot some of the signs that someone may be struggling with their mental health and how to open up a conversation with them.

Sarah McIntosh:

The biggest thing for me from that course, there were in my sort of close circle I'd got two um family members who had different types of issues around their mental health, so one where I suspected there were some issues around self-harm, but I had no idea how to open up a conversation and what the course did was give me that real confidence to be able to open up a conversation and actually signpost them to a GP and then also into the right sort of pathways to get them some support and help, which was sort of revelationary for the individual but also for me as well, trying to work out how best to help them and also another family member who has anxiety and panic disorder and agoraphobia, and being able to sort of empathise more with them and therefore have better conversations with them.

Sarah McIntosh:

So the biggest impact for me initially was on a personal level, but then I started to use the skills with my colleagues in the workplace as a line manager, as a leader, to just check in with people and, where I was worried about people, be able to open up a conversation to say you're OK, I've noticed this about you, what's going on, how can I help you. And that led to some really great sort of conversations where people were able to go off and do some self-care for themselves, go and talk to some people, think about how they could reduce their stress levels, but also where there were, you know, certain scenarios where perhaps they needed to go and see a GP and seek more professional pathway services. They were able to go and do that, so it's been really impactful for me on an individual level and, I think, from a workplace level as well, in the different roles and organisations that I've worked in.

Simon Blake:

And I remember doing it, probably a couple of years after you had done it and just thinking I wish I'd done this 20 years ago. You're really one of those courses and mental health first aid has obviously been a really important part of many workplaces approach to mental health and well-being, promoting well-being in the workplace, and we've learned a lot obviously at MHF England about how to help workplaces to implement mental health first aid. So do you want to just tell us a little bit about some of the good practice, what makes it successful and what are some of the changes that we made a couple of years ago to help mental health first aiders be better equipped in the role?

Sarah McIntosh:

Yeah, I think from a good practice perspective there's sort of two levels to that. So there's one at an organisational level. So lots of workplaces might go let's get a mental health first aider or a network of mental health first aiders in our organisation, because they've perhaps heard really good things about the impact that they can have. We always talk to any workplace to say, look, really consider what's your approach overall to mental health and well-being. So, having a policy, having some plans in place, thinking about you know what are some of the stresses in your workplace and what are the preventative measures around some of those. But also, what support are you going to put in place for individuals so that it's not just the MHFA or the network being the only thing that you have available in your organisation. So really thinking about it strategically and holistically and also thinking about, if you do put an MHFA network in place, how do you support them? How do you check in with them that they're in the right frame of mind to be continuing to do the role? Do they need to pause? Have you got enough mental health first aiders in your organisation? How do you learn perhaps some of the key themes not necessarily the specific conversations or who's had a conversation, because there's a level of confidentiality around it.

Sarah McIntosh:

But are there specific themes that are coming through from those mental health first aiders about the workplace or what employees might need in terms of support as well, and really use them as a force for good in the workplace to change organisational culture as well as help people on an individual level as well?

Sarah McIntosh:

So I think that's what the organisation can do. I think, if you're a mental health first aider being really clear on what the role of a mental health first aider is and having clear boundaries when you're supporting people with conversations, making sure that you take time for self-care if you've, you know, had a difficult conversation with someone and it's impacted you, taking the time out for you, being able to step away from the role and you know, feeling that you've got permission to do that with your organisation as well, and you know we have lots of mental health first aiders who want to develop their empathy levels around different types of lived experience of mental ill health. So continually learning and listening and sort of developing your understanding and knowledge about different types of mental health conditions and how you can support people, you know is probably how you can be the best mental health first aider you can be.

Simon Blake:

And we have obviously got some guides one for the workplace, one for the mental health first aider, which we will put links to in the show notes and, you know, an app and various other bits of information. We can just tell us some of the changes which we made in 2022 yes.

Sarah McIntosh:

So the course itself. We have lots of fantastic feedback from both individuals and from organizations or community groups that they may belong to about how great the course is and the wealth of knowledge and skills that people kind of leave the course with. The thing that was a challenge for individuals and also organizations was how do you support people beyond the course? So, rather than it just being a two-day training course that you go on and then you're kind of left to fend for yourselves to work out what the role is, how do you do it? How do you build that confidence? I think people described it as having the stabilizers on. It's like trying to trying to ride a bike. I feel like I've got my stabilizers on. Um, how how can I connect back in to mental health first aid England or the instructor that delivered my course to get support beyond the course so I can become really confident and really effective in my role?

Sarah McIntosh:

So we looked at the program itself and we moved away from it just being a two-day training course to it being a sort of three-year supported continuous learning journey and put lots of support in place for the mental health first aider. So what we did was we introduced support and benefits for the mental health first aider. So what we did was we introduced support and benefits for our mental health first aiders so effectively, beyond their course, they were able to access resources that would help them in their role, and we launch new resources all of the time. We have a library of those resources and recorded webinars as well, and there are new webinars coming out all the time. So those webinars could range from somebody sharing their own lived experience of living with a particular mental health condition, or perhaps around diversity and inclusion and identity and how the intersectionality with mental health can play out. So lots and lots of webinars for them to continue their learning.

Sarah McIntosh:

We've also got a Mental Health First Aiders support app, so Mental Health First Aiders can download the app. It means that they've got a whole heap of signposting resources at their fingertips. So if I was supporting you in a conversation and there was a particular issue for you, I could use the app and look for local services, local charities, helplines, advice groups, counseling groups, look in your local area or look nationally and be able to sort of signpost you into different types of support as well. So having that at your fingertips is quite helpful on the go, as you're kind of developing those conversations with people. So we've put lots of support in place and at the end of three years we encourage people to kind of retake a refresher course in mental health first aid. So it keeps those knowledge and skills, the latest trends, developments, clinical updates around mental health. It keeps that fresh and people are kind of in that supported ongoing learning and development cycle.

Simon Blake:

Really, and all of that's had some fantastic um feedback. Um, and today we're launching this episode of this podcast because we've got a rather exciting development that we want to tell people about. So could you tell us about that?

Sarah McIntosh:

Yeah, so we looked at the impact that having those support beyond the course has given us. So we've got there are 6 million MHF aiders globally but there are 300,000 that we have trained here in England, which is a huge community of people, and we've gone out and sort of said to them how is support and benefits going? How are you experiencing that ongoing support, that ongoing support? We've had some phenomenal feedback that 92% of people who are MHFaders say that their role is really challenging stigma around mental health. Again, over 90% feel that they're transforming the way that society, but also their workplace, is talking about and supporting mental health. And the one that I'm most proud of is 91% of those MHFaders feel that their role is helping to save lives, which is a phenomenal impact.

Sarah McIntosh:

We know that there are so many conversations that our mental health first aiders have as well. So we've effectively got over half of our mental health first aiders are using their skills more than once a week, with a further 30% who are using them perhaps once a month, with a further 30% who are using them perhaps once a month. And if you kind of do some crude maths, that effectively means that our mental health first aiders are having around 13 million conversations a year where they're supporting someone and trying to help them and improve their mental health and signpost them to either self-care activities or into the right pathways. So it's having a phenomenal impact already, which is brilliant. But we want to take that one step further.

Sarah McIntosh:

So we're really excited today to be launching the Association of Mental Health First Aiders. So this will be the first and only membership body for mental health first aiders and it creates a huge community of those 300,000 mental health first aiders. It still allows them to access support and benefits so they'll be able to access the resources, the webinars, the mental health first aid app in that three-year supported cycle beyond their two-day course. But it gives us a great platform to look at what else we can do to support them, to champion and celebrate the great impact that they have, to get their insights and sort of amplify their voices really in terms of you know what do they need from us, what might they need from their workplaces and what impacts they're having generally in society, so we can amplify some of those celebratory impacts and share the great news and good work that they're doing really. So, yeah, huge step for us today, really excited to to launch it and have more people join as we move forward with it.

Simon Blake:

And I mean it is a really exciting day. It's been a lot of work, a long time in development and I'm really proud and really excited and grateful to everybody that's been involved in all of that work. How do people find out more?

Sarah McIntosh:

if you are a mental health first aider, already between July and September you'll get your own personal invitation to join the association and to continue to receive the support and benefits that we've talked about, or perhaps access them for the first time if you've not already got access to them.

Sarah McIntosh:

If you are interested in becoming a mental health first aider and joining the association, you can obviously take our mental health first aid course and once you have completed the course, you'll be invited to join the association as soon as you've completed your course, for free and be able to benefit from being part of one of the largest membership communities around really. So lots of ways to join. There's also if you've perhaps trained with another mental health first aid provider that isn't mental health first aid england, um, if you've done a level three qualification around mental health first aid as part of that training course, you can come and take our refresher course, um, and sort of come and join the association. We'll support you to sort of understand the way that we discuss mental health and the way that we open up conversations and the action plan that we use to help and support people, and you can come and join us in the association and get some of those benefits as well and is there a website people can go and find out more?

Sarah McIntosh:

there is, so the association has a website. It is wwwaomhfaorg.

Simon Blake:

Brilliant and again, we'll put that in the show notes. So, sarah, thank you for giving us a brief overview in relation to mental health first aiders and to the fantastically exciting news about the association, and we look forward to many of you listeners joining, being part of this movement that keeps on growing and having bigger and bigger impact. Thank you, sarah, for talking to us about mental health first aid, mental health first aid developments and the new association. Listeners are as excited as we are, and do go and find out more at the website, wwwaomhfaorg. Thanks for listening.

Introduction Voice Over:

see you next time get show notes, the podcast archive and information on how mhfa england can support your workplace well-being at mhfaenglandorg. Join our thriving community on social media at MHFA England and join us soon for more help and inspiration on the Off the Top of your Head podcast. Together, we will improve the mental health of the nation.