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Abstract
Background: The Health Service is among the largest employers in Britain and has the potential to provide supported work for significant numbers of people who have been long-term unemployed as a result of mental health problems.
Aims: The study set out to investigate the feasibility and impact of employing mental health service users as health care assistants within an assertive outreach team.
Method: Forty-five clients of the assertive outreach team were randomly assigned to receive either standard case management (n = 21) or to case management plus additional input from a consumer-employee (n = 24) working as a health care assistant (HCA) to the team.
Results: Clients allocated to the HCAs were more engaged with treatment as reflected in lower rates of non-attendance at appointments, higher levels of participation in structured social care activities and significantly fewer unmet needs in the domains of daytime activity, company, finances, transport and access to benefits. There were no differences between groups in terms of social networks (size or subjective quality) or in satisfaction with the service received.
Conclusions: Employing service consumers in front-line caring roles is feasible and may contribute to improved client engagement with services.
Conflict of interest: None.