David Smith joins our Board of Directors

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Making Families Count is delighted to announce that David Smith has joined us as a Director. David is a family member with lived experience who has taken part in several MFC webinars as a speaker. He is insightful, knowledgeable, and highly experienced, and we know he will be a fantastic addition to our team of Directors. David says: “I am delighted to have been invited to join the Board of MFC. I hope the knowledge I have gained through my involvement with NHS services in working with families and carers, together with a lifetime working in the field of governance, …

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MFC in Partnership with Autism Oxford and Surrey County Council

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Making Families Count have delivered a range of webinars in partnership with Autism Oxford to Surrey County Council. The webinars have been focused on suicide prevention and autism, delivering training to a range of health and education staff in the County. We have provided the focus on families with lived experience of both autism and suicide prevention, and members of Making Families Count have delivered presentations in those webinars. Autism Oxford provided information about autism and the impact this might have on those who are diagnosed or not and may be considered neurodivergent. We know that around 700,000 people may …

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New handbook published for best practice after a patient safety event

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To mark World Patient Safety Day, Making Families Count and several NHS trusts have published a new handbook entitled “Compassionate communication, meaningful engagement” for all NHS staff. The handbook aims to improve collaboration with patients, their families and carers following a patient safety event. You can get more information and download the handbook here.

HSJ Patient Safety Congress – 18 and 19 September

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On Monday 18 and Tuesday 19 September 2023, the 16th HSJ Patient Safety Congress is being held in Manchester. With over 1,000 people attending, including 143 NHS Trusts and 19 ICS, it’s looking as if this year’s congress is going to have the largest attendance to date.  For the first time, Making Families Count is an official charity partner and we will be running a stand in the exhibitor’s hall. If you’re going to be coming to the congress, please come by and see us – we’d be delighted to meet new and old friends! On Monday 18 September MFC will be …

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“Filming Family Voices” Project

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MFC is working on a new project, filming family members talking about their experiences. We are calling this “Filming Family Voices” and so far we’ve recorded 6 short films. All the films are simply family members speaking about an aspect of their experience which they found profoundly traumatic, questions they have which have never been answered, or statements around what they’ve learned from their experiences. We’ll be using these films in various ways in our training and presentations. We’ll be continuing to make more films over the next few months until we’ve built up a unique and powerful library of films.  If …

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Putting Safety at the Centre of Quality – 13 September 2023

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Making Families Count’s Rosi Reed will be speaking at The Royal College of Psychiatrists in London on 13 September 2023 at their SIRAN (Serious Incident Review Accreditation Network) event which is titled “Putting Safety at the Centre of Quality”.  Rosi will be speaking about the work of MFC; not only our training work but also the projects and the co-production work in her presentation “Poorly Managed Investigations and their Effect on Families”. For more information, visit the SIRAN event page.

Am I a Useful Idiot?

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Trevor Stevens

Like many people I’ve met since my daughter died by suicide in December 2020, I have tried to turn my grief into something positive.  Such a positive response is quite common. Generally, for those whose child has died in this manner, their uppermost if not necessarily initial thought is that they do not want other parents to experience the same tragedy. It might arise instead of anger or as a reaction to anger or even in addition to anger. It’s rare for anger not to be felt; in fact, it’s so rare that I have yet to meet anyone who …

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Saving a young person’s life

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Trevor Stevens

If you want to know how to look after suicidal young people, you can’t do much better than read this. It’s the true story of a teenager who credits her teacher with saving her life. What follows is a summary – the full version can be listened to at BBC Sounds.  Polly had struggled with anxiety and low moods throughout school and had gone through various Associations that provided talking therapy. Unprovoked, her mental health started to spiral, and she suffered a severe depressive episode. She became dependent on self-harm. She opened up to her Head of Year, who supported …

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The C word.

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The church has long held the view that suicide was a sin.  PAPYRUS challenged the Catholic church’s view that suicide was a sin, which also contributed to the stigma around suicide and the view that the suicidal person had ‘committed’ a sin. We were sent a very clear message that the Catholic church did not hold the view that a person had ‘committed a sin’ if they were clearly unwell at the time. We did the same with other faiths and received the same kind of response. It is becoming clearer that the term ‘committed suicide’ is no longer appropriate.  …

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