Poster display opportunities for GP practices

The Care Responders Study, funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR), is exploring how children and young people experiencing a mental health crisis can be better supported across health, social care, policing and emergency services. The study is examining different approaches to crisis response, including collaborative models involving children's mental health practitioners and police officers during evenings and weekends, alongside existing pathways of care.

Our goal is to understand what works, for whom, in which circumstances, and why. We are speaking with young people, parents and carers, social services, police officers, mental health practitioners and relevant NHS professionals to understand their experiences and identify opportunities for improvement. Primary Care practitioners and teams frequently provide continuity of care before, during and after periods of crisis. We are very keen to hear from people within Primary Care to understand more about how communication works between services and how Primary Care teams manage risk following a mental health crisis. 

Although data collection is ongoing, several themes are beginning to emerge. Practitioners consistently highlight the importance of effective collaboration between services. One participant reflected:

"By working with different police officers, I felt that you built up that really good working relationship with them and that also it was helping them to improve their skills and knowledge of working with an individual when they were in crisis."

Participants have also emphasised the value of proactive planning and coordination across services. One practitioner described developing personalised trigger plans to support young people during future crises:

"I've been involved in trying to create trigger plans for young people so that if they are located by police in the community, the police are less likely to detain or use restrictive practises because they're known and we've got a plan in place."

Another important finding relates to the need for trauma-responsive care. Practitioners have described how previous experiences with services can influence how young people engage during a crisis, highlighting the need for flexible, compassionate and individualised approaches.

These emerging findings are highly relevant for primary care. General practice often plays a central role in care planning, mental health monitoring, family support, and coordinating referrals across services. Understanding what happens when young people present in crisis, particularly outside of usual service hours, can help inform future pathways, communication between agencies, and continuity of care.

We would like to hear from you

We are keen to hear from:

• GPs and GP trainees;

• Primary care mental health practitioners;

• Practice nurses;

• Social prescribers;

• Advanced clinical practitioners;

• Physician Associates;

• Professionals working within Primary Care Networks;

• 
  

The study is on the NIHR portfolio but please note that there are no accruals or any funding available.

If you have any questions or any of your HCPs are interested, please direct to danielle.richardson-2@postgrad.manchester.ac.uk.

The aim of the DISCA Sleep Buddy study is to see if a new website can help parents/carers of children aged 6-12 years with a diagnosis of ADHD to improve their child’s sleep.

Sleep Buddy was developed by parents and carers of children with ADHD working with sleep experts. It has personalised information and advice on how primary caregivers can manage their child’s sleep problems with videos and top tips from other parents. The website will help primary caregivers to create a sleep plan to help their child’s sleep.

Requirements: You can help by displaying this poster advertising the study in your practice. P​lease use the link exactly as it appears on the recruitment flyer​.

The MAMA trial aims to find out the effects of temporarily stopping or continuing biologics during pregnancy. The team is comparing whether women who continue their biologics throughout pregnancy have better arthritis control compared to those who stop before 28 completed weeks’ gestation and restart no earlier than 2 weeks after the end of pregnancy.

Requirements: You can help by displaying this poster advertising the study in your practice.