Thames Reach and partners win London Homelessness Award

Psychology in Hostels (PIH), a project involving Thames Reach, South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust, and the London Borough of Lambeth, has been announced as one of the three winners of the prestigious 2018 London Homelessness Awards. The partnership will find out if they have won the top prize of £30,000 at a special event in October.

Dr Emma Williamson, Clinical Psychologist and Clinical Lead of the PIH team, said:

“This partnership is a national leader in delivering ‘psychologically informed environments’: this is when a hostel or service focuses on the psychological impact of being homeless, and understanding that people who are homeless often experience problems with their mental health including trauma.

“This way of working places mental health and wellbeing at the centre of all treatment and interventions.

“Our teams work in three Lambeth hostels, and have recently expanded to deliver services across Westminster and Greenwich.

“In the hostels, the psychologists work within a multi-agency team, including residents, to design and deliver the service. By offering a highly-skilled mix of doctoral level NHS clinical psychologists and hostel teams, many barriers to service access are removed.”

Ian was a resident of Graham House and found the service extremely useful. He said:

“Having access to the team made me feel safe, I felt that I could leave the world outside and focus on rebuilding myself and recovering my mental health.

“Being part of the art groups brought back a lot of my love for that kind of expression, and I don’t mind sounding corny when I say that it helped me to reconnect to myself.”

Simon Dow chaired the judging panel for the London Homelessness Awards. He said:

“This partnership project shows what can be achieved when the NHS, local authorities and voluntary sector work together. Over the last two years over 200 residents have engaged with the team, and 1650 therapy sessions offered with a very impressive 78% attendance rate.”

More details about the London Homelessness Awards can be found at www.lhawards.org.uk.