Service User Advisory Group & Care Pathways Involvement

1. Service User Advisory Group & Care Pathways Involvement Psychosis CAG Anne Kirby, Psychosis CAG

2. What is the Psychosis Clinical Academic Group (CAG)? The Psychosis CAG is a management department which delivers SLaM’s services for people with a diagnosis of psychosis (e.g. schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder.) The CAG covers Croydon, Lambeth Southwark and Lewisham. Anne Kirby, Psychosis CAG

3. What does the CAG do? The CAG brings together: • Clinical services (e.g. such as the Inpatient Wards at the Maudsley Hospital. Staff in these services include Doctors, Nurses, Occupational Therapists & Psychologists), • Research (e.g. studies into medications and therapies for schizophrenia) • Education of the service staff (e.g. training in use of medication or family therapy) Anne Kirby, Psychosis CAG

4. Why did SLaM set up CAGs? Having services, research and education in one management group means that education and research are planned together to help improve services for the people who use them. For example, an Occupational Therapist may notice that people seem to find it easier to give up smoking when receiving a particular sort of therapy and suggest that researchers look into this. Anne Kirby, Psychosis CAG

5. Clinical + research + education That’s interesting, the last six people who received this therapy gave up smoking within 6 weeks. Could you research that? I’ve looked into it and this therapy does seem to help people who are diagnosed with schizophrenia to quit. We’d better train the staff! That’s great I’ve given up smoking at last thanks to the therapy my nurse recommended – she really knew her stuff! Benefits to Service users Anne Kirby, Psychosis CAG