New Ways of Working group seeks examples of innovative health psychology practice
As many of you will be aware the New Ways of Working (NWW) in Applied Psychology initiative has been running since July 2005 and it has been exploring how applied psychology can develop to take account of the changing NHS workforce context. This work is being conducted jointly by the National Institute of Mental Health in England and the British Psychological Society's NWW Group (see www.bps.org.uk for further details). The group has established seven project groups one of which is dealing with identifying examples of new ways of working. Specifically, this group is interested in examples of working practices that demonstrate innovation, flexibility and/or are using a different approach which have a real impact for people using NHS services. The group is also looking for examples of practice that are relevant to NHS priorities (e.g., long-term conditions, increasing access for disadvantaged groups, redesigning of services to be more efficient).This is where you, the DHP members, come in. If you are aware of or are involved in working practices within the area of health psychology that are innovative and/or that are having a real impact on the provision of health and social care, then please let me know in the first instance (d.b.o’connor@leeds.ac.uk).
This represents an excellent opportunity for the DHP to contribute to the important developments in the provision of applied psychology within the NHS and to the future of health psychology more generally. Therefore, I do hope that many DHP members will be able to help at this exciting time. As things are moving very quickly, we require your responses as soon as possible.