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Leeds Mind is working with a team of volunteers from across West Yorkshire on a Suicide Prevention project.

Our project volunteers, who all have lived experience of being impacted by suicide, work towards creating systems change in mental health. “Some of the ways we can do that is to influence and shape the practice of staff working within health and care”.

Volunteers recently created a new resource called ‘Lived Experience Involvement – Guidelines for Best Practice’, which you can read and download below.

lived exp vols

This resource is aimed at all staff working within health and care who involve people with lived experience in their work. Involving people with lived experience might take the form of service design, inviting people with lived experience to sit on an interview panel, or on an advisory group. There are many forms it can take!

Our volunteers have drawn upon their own lived experience of involvement, and on the Mind ‘Influence and Participation’ toolkit to create this resource.

We encourage everyone to read it, use and share it. It’s suitable for anyone working in health and care, whether you’re experienced in lived experience involvement, or are just starting out. If you’re a person with lived experience, we’d also like to hear your thoughts. Have you taken part in any involvement work? What was your experience? What advice would you give to staff working in this way? If you’d like to offer feedback, you can contact the project coordinator Arlie.haslam@leedsmind.org.uk