Mental health charity's change of name reflects person-centred approach
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A ribbon-cutting ceremony in Wick marked a fresh start for a leading Highland mental health charity that is adopting a new name to reflect its person-centred ethos.
Birchwood Highland is now known as Centred, and the rebranding was celebrated on Friday at a gathering of staff, service users, family members and stakeholders at the charity's Caithness base at Wick Business Park.
The organisation also operates in Inverness, Lochaber and Easter Ross and events took place across its offices during the week to highlight the changeover.
Birchwood was established in Inverness 35 years ago to promote independence, inclusion and recovery for people experiencing mental ill-health.
The original name came from a street in the Inshes Wood area of the Highland capital where the first service was located.
June Jeffrey, the Inverness-based head of health and social care, community services, explained that the new branding came about after some research among service users, families and staff.
She said: “While it was small and in Inverness, it had an emotional meaning because people knew that name – that's where the service was based.
“As it grew and moved out of Inverness, it became less meaningful – people would say, 'Birchwood, is that a forestry company? Birchwood, have they got holiday lodges somewhere?'
“So there was this confusion about who we were and what we did. And the name didn't reflect or say anything about care or support or the things that we did in our communities.
“Right from the beginning we've been person-centred – the person that we support is the centre of everything we do.
“There were many names, and it was put out there: what one do you think means a lot to you, to the people we support? Centred came from that. And it does reflect who we've always been, who we continue to be – which is providing bespoke, individual, person-centred care."
The charity's Wick base was in Harbour Terrace before moving to the business park at Lochshell.
There are now 29 full-time-equivalent staff in Caithness. They provide a Care at Home service for 72 people covering most of the county, from Berriedale and Duneath to John O'Groats and Dunnet, as well as a Housing Support service for 24 users extending as far as Tongue and Strathnaver.
Sophie Bramley, the Wick-based health and social team manager, said: “We are very widespread. We don't ever say 'well, it's too far out of our range'.
“Care at Home is allowing our elderly community to be able to live independently, safely, at home rather than them being in a care setting like care homes or hospitals. The elderly to me are at the heart of the community.
“In the Housing Support side of the service we do all sorts of things – budgeting, correspondence, supporting people to cook meals, going out for lunch with people, even just that social aspect of support.
“In Housing Support we work with people from the age of 16 and one of our oldest service users is 90. We work with all varieties of needs.
“If the contract states that 'this is what you must do', we would like to be doing more than that – we want to be that one step ahead.
“We've got really good relationships here with our social work team, our community mental health team, and they are relationships that take time to build.
“But I'm a firm believer in joint working, that we should be working as one to get the best outcome.
“We recently did two satisfaction surveys, one for the Care at Home service users and one for Housing Support. And the feedback that we got is that the service, from where it was to where it's going, has vastly improved.
"People seem to be getting continuity. Especially for the elderly, it's quite important that they get consistency with the people that provide their support.
“Our staff team are one of my main priorities. We recruit people from all walks of life, people that have maybe suffered from mental health conditions themselves, and we're a family-friendly organisation.”
The ribbon-cutting was carried out by service users Amiee Marks, Stacy McIntosh and Kelsie O'Brien at the new Centred sign at the front of the building before guests went inside to enjoy a small buffet.
