Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust (LPT) and its buddy trust, Northamptonshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust (NHFT) have signed the Equally Well Charter for Equal Health, as our commitment to ensuring that patients with long term mental health conditions have access to high quality help and support for their physical health.

Cathy Ellis, Chair of LPT, signed the Equally Well Charter for Equal Health on Tuesday 1 September at a virtual meeting of the Board.

LPT and NHFT are working in partnership to share best practice and ensure our services continue to meet the needs of our local communities. Crishni Waring, Chair of NHFT, signed the Equally Well Charter for Equal Health on Thursday 3 September at a virtual meeting of the Board.

LPT provide community health and mental health services across Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland and is committed to creating high quality, compassionate care and wellbeing for all. The Trust is continually working with its service users, patients, staff and visitors to review the services it provides, using lived experiences to develop its care provision.

Equally Well UK is asking all health service providers and commissioners, organisations which provide mental health services, or work with people experiencing mental health illness to work with them to sign the charter and reduce the physical health inequalities for people with severe mental illness.

LPT and NHFT share Equally Well UK’s vision to ensure that everyone living with a long-term mental health condition has access to effective, timely, consistent and responsive help at every stage of their life for their physical health and has an equal chance of enjoying a healthy and, ultimately, equal life expectancy.

Cathy Ellis, chair of LPT said: “By pledging our commitment to the Equally Well Charter for equal health, we will take another step forward to ensuring our services continue to evolve and meet the needs of our local communities.

“We will strive to ensure that all of our services are accessible to anyone experiencing mental health problems so that they can live longer and healthier lives.  Our colleagues at LPT will continue to work with service users to improve their physical wellbeing and to prevent, treat and manage physical health problems, creating individual care plans tailored to their needs.”

Emma Bailey, Project Manager for Equally Well UK, added: “We are delighted to have Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust and Northamptonshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust join our growing membership of organisations all pledging to improve the physical health care for people with a severe mental illness.”

To find out more about Equally Well visit: www.equallywell.co.uk

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NOTES TO EDITORS

  • Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust (LPT) provides community health, mental health and learning disabilities services for the one million people living in Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland. We have a budget in excess of £275 million and employ approximately 5,500 staff. For more information visit: leicspart.nhs.uk. Our registered charity is called Raising Health (charity number 1057361). The charity fundraises to support excellent care initiatives, equipment and innovations which go above and beyond core NHS provision to enhance the experience of our patients, service users and staff. See www.raisinghealth.org.uk

For further information contact: Kartik Bhalla, External Communications Officer,  Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust, Email: Kartik.Bhalla@leicspart.nhs.uk and communications@leicspart.nhs.uk