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Gifts from The Morning Star
Resounding success of groundbreaking approach to mental health care
Ruth Hunt speaks to DR JENNIFER KILCOYNE about Mersey Care No Force First's policy that has reduced assaults against staff by 21 per cent, instances of causing harm to staff by 31 per cent, has won it awards and gained international recognition

CURRENTLY, there seems to be no let-up of bad news stories about mental health. However, despite the challenging environment nationally, the improvements made in Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust with regard to how they manage conflict has led to a cultural shift on the wards, along with international recognition and awards.

These developments are focused on the reduction of forceful restraint in a strategy called No Force First, which has the potential to be transferred and adopted in other settings such as prisons and police cells.

Within Mersey Care, Dr Jennifer Kilcoyne explained that there was the growing realisation within the clinical teams that the amount of physical intervention being used in the trust, although not increasing, wasn’t particularly coming down either.

What is exciting is that the principles in the No Force First model can be adopted into other settings, such as secure hospitals, prisons and potentially police cells

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