Community Services

As one of the caseworkers for the Pathway Development Service, I have a generic role as the rest of my colleagues in terms of assessment and consultation. My specific emphasis is to focus on the possible pathways available through statutory and voluntary sector services across the region. This has included visiting Community Mental Health Teams, Community Forensic Teams, Drug and Alcohol Services, Day Services, Advocacy to highlight a few. My experience to date has been largely that services across the region are commissioned differently, communicate differently and approach personality disorder in their own ways.  This has real impact on the workforce’s understanding of personality disorder and the pathways available.

I have visited specialist personality disorder services across the region such as the Twilight Project, which has highlighted areas of good practice and identified specialist interest workers regarding personality disorder in most areas of the region.

I am also involved in offering awareness training regarding personality disorder for services across the region on a monthly basis.

I am a Learning Disability nurse and have spent most of my career working within mental health settings. Previous to my current role, I have worked in forensic, alcohol, eating disorder and elderly services. My last post was working as a care coordinator for the Personality Disorder Clinical Network in Leeds, which is a community based personality disorder service offering support to individuals for up to a two year period.