If you are a veteran and experiencing a mental health crisis, you can visit the NHS 111 online service...
...and you will be referred into the Hampshire and Isle of Wight Veterans' Mental Health High Intensity Service.
Solent’s Veterans’ High Intensity Service (HIS) provides care and treatment for former armed forces personnel (veterans) and their loved ones who are in a mental health crisis and need urgent help.
The HIS is part of a new national pathfinder being rolled out across areas of England from November 2020 onwards, with Solent as the Lead Provider for the Hampshire and the Isle of Wight. Solent will also be leading on the new NHS111 service across the South East of England in 2021.
Solent NHS Trust is proud to be working with mental health trusts across the South East, South Central Ambulance Service Foundation Trust, All Call Signs and Walking With The Wounded.
The HIS is part of a trio of specialist mental health support for veterans which are already up and running across the South of England, which includes the Veterans’ Complex Treatment Service (CTS) and the Veterans’ Mental Health Transition, Intervention and Liaison Service (TILS). These three services form OpCOURAGE, the Veterans' Mental Health and Wellbeing Service.
From Monday 23 November veterans or their loved ones, from across the South East of England, can visit NHS 111 if they need urgent mental health support or in a crisis, say that they are a veteran and access rapid support from mental health practitioners within 111. Wrap-around care from the rest of the HIS team will be rolled out across the SE in phases. Hampshire and the Isle of Wight is launching first on the 16 November, with Sussex, Surrey, Kent, Berkshire, Oxford and Buckinghamshire following over the coming weeks.
Across Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, the service is being delivered in partnership. Solent NHS Trust is proud to be working with IoW NHS Trust, Southern Health Foundation Trust, South Central Ambulance Service Foundation Trust, All Call Signs and Walking With The Wounded.
This service provides:
- A service that has been designed by veterans, for veterans and that employs veterans – improving their experience and likely engagement with treatment
- A joined -up experience of care – reducing the feeling of being passed around the system
- A better experience for veterans struggling with mental health problems, leading to improved health, reduced hospital stays and serious incidents and a higher quality of life
- Greater opportunity for family, friend and carer involvement and improved outcomes for all
The HIS is provided by a partnership of well-established expert organisations, including:
- Solent NHS Trust – who are the lead provider
- Veteran’s support charity Walking With The Wounded
- Veterans’ mental health peer support organisation, All Call Signs
- Southern Health Trust Foundation Trust
- South Central Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust
- Isle of Wight NHS Trust
- Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust
- Kent and Medway NHS and Social Care Partnership Trust
- Surrey and Boarders Partnership NHS Foundation Trust
- Berkshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust
- Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust
The HIS employs clinical staff who will have the appropriate skills to support veterans and local NHS teams when the veteran is in crisis or is admitted to a mental health inpatient ward. This will include a team of psychologists, mental health professionals and Veteran Liaison and Support Officers – some of whom will be veterans themselves.
In partnership with
