Authors: Natalie Cutler and Tim Heffernan, NSW
Year: 2015
Event: 2015 TheMHS Conference
Subject: 2015 Conference Book of Proceedings, Safety for All, acute mental health inpatient services, 2015 TheMHS Conference
Type of resource: Conference Presentations and Papers
Abstract: This paper is based on a project the authors were involved in called Safety for All. The objective of Safety for All was to reorient mental health practice in our respective acute mental health inpatient services away from a culture of coercion, toward a culture of collaboration. The Safety for All project was undertaken in the former South Eastern Sydney & Illawarra Area Health Service (now adjacent Local Health Districts in NSW). Our objective was to transform the culture of our acute mental health services from one of ‘managing risk’, to one where the development of authentic relationships between consumers and staff was seen as the foundation of safety. Our aim – as the project’s name suggests, was to prioritise the safety needs of mental health consumers equally with those of staff. This paper outlines the inspiration for Safety for All, and some of our learnings through the development and implementation processes.
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