Welcome to the re-launched BSMHD Newsletter. We will be sending you a newsletter every two months, and three times a year it will be accompanied by a free copy of Deaf Worlds, the International Journal of Deaf Studies. Deaf Worlds is edited by Graham H Turner, published by Douglas McLean and distributed by Forest Books. It is the premier international journal of Deaf Studies, providing a focus for analysis and debate on social, cultural, historical, political, linguistic, anthropological and psychological factors influencing the lives of individual deaf people, and their relationships with the communities and societies in which they live. We hope you will find it an interesting read and a significant benefit of membership. This edition of the Newsletter is relatively brief. It is hoped that it will expand so do please send in articles to be included in the next Issue.

BSMHD Secretariat

In October 2003 the Honorary Officers appointed UK Council on Deafness (UKCoD) to provide secretariat services to the Society and appointed Jonathan Isaac (UKCoD's Director) as General Secretary. UKCoD will be responsible for maintaining the membership database, issuing invoices, the newsletter, organising the Annual Conference and regular Council Meetings, maintaining the website and generally developing the activities of the Society under the direction of the Honorary Officers.

Election of Honorary Officers

Our present Chair, Sharon Ridgeway, has announced that she is retiring and her place is being temporarily filled by Peter Hindley who is also Vice Chair and Hon Secretary. At present the only other Honorary Officer that we have is our Hon Treasurer, Steve Powell. It is very important that we elect more Honorary Officers, our constitution requires us to have at least four. At the AGM, which will be held during the lunch break at the Annual Conference in Cardiff, we will be holding elections for up to six Honorary Officers. We have increased the number of Vice Chairs from one to three and each Vice Chair will have responsibility for ensuring that our activities are relevant to the members from England, Scotland and Wales.

www.bsmhd.org.uk

The new BSMHD website has now been launched. There are details about the Society, a Directory of Member and Affiliated Organisations, details of the benefits of membership and how to join and full details of the Conference. The website will develop into the central information source for the Society so do please send us your suggestions for additional content.

Towards Equity & Access

The Department of Health response to the Sign of the Times: Modernising Mental Health Services for Deaf People will be launched on May 4th under the title Towards Equity and Access. It will be featured on the NIMHE website at www.nimhe.org.uk , further details will be available shortly.

Healthy Deaf Minds

Sign has taken over the responsibility for the administration and organising of the Healthy Deaf Minds events that take place at the Friends House, Euston Road, London. Meetings will continue to be held at the Friends House with the next meeting taking place in April. Date details will be confirmed shortly. A guest speaker, name to be confirmed, will be speaking about 'Old Peoples Homes where they look after deaf people.'

This will be followed by a discussion of what services deaf people would like to see available in the year 2030!

Sign would like to take this opportunity of thanking Roger Beeson for all his hard work in organising the HDM events up until now and welcome Roger Hewitt, the new organiser.

The aims of HDM are

• to inform the Deaf/BSL Community about mental health issues
• to empower the community to express its views
• to inform service providers about the views of Deaf/BSL people

There is a Yahoo! group notice-board which gives information about meetings. Contact Roger Hewitt on [email protected] if you want to be added to the HDM emailing list.

BSMHD 2004 Annual Conference

Mental Health Services for Deaf People - Achieving Equity and Access

Booking Forms are now available for this year's Annual Conference which will be held at the Angel Hotel, Cardiff on 27th May. The conference will be chaired by Margaret du Feu, opened by Jeff McWhinney and the keynote speaker is Jane Hutt, Welsh Assembly Minister for Health and Social Services. The programme includes:

An overview of Mental Health Services for Deaf People in Wales - Margaret du Feu, Consultant in Psychiatry, Queen Elizabeth Psychiatric Hospital, Birmingham

Towards Equity & Access in Wales - Phil Chick, Director of Mental Health at the Welsh Assembly

The provision of and access to Mental Health Services for Deaf People - Catherine Thomas, Researcher for National Deaf Services, London

Drop in facilities for deaf people: Developing partnerships with generic mental health organisations - Simon Hesselberg of Brent Deaf People's Group

Advocacy and Deaf People's Rights - Jo Baister-Nicolls, Head of Advocacy Services at Sign

D/deaf People's Access to Nursing Education: A hurdle at a time - Noel Traynor, Research Fellow, University of Salford

Video-Conferencing: Remote Access to Services - Sally Austen, Consultant Clinical Psychologist, National Deaf Mental Health Services, Birmingham

Why Mentors are so important to Deaf Young People - Carolyn Nabarro, Centre for Deaf Studies, University of Bristol

Access to the Criminal Justice System: Suggestibility and deafness - Sue O'Rourke, Consultant Clinical Psychologist, Mayflower Hospitals

Access to Primary Care - Dr David Reeves, University of Manchester

The programme is still be developed and will be finalised shortly. The latest version will always be available on the BSMHD website. A booking form is enclosed, we do hope that as many members as possible will be able to attend. Do also encourage your colleagues to join us. There is a £20 discount on the delegate fee for members.

The Bad Ischl Declaration of the ESMHD 2003 Congress.

Agreed by the 6th ESMHD European Congress on Mental Health and Deafness at Bad Ischl, Austria 24th May 2003.

The 6th ESMHD European Congress on Mental Health and Deafness welcomes the decisions of the Parliamentary Assembly and the European Parliament to recognise that Sign Languages are minority languages in Europe, and calls upon European Union Institutions, Member and Accession states, the Council of Europe and countries worldwide to legally recognise Sign Language(s), and in so doing respect the cultural diversity of the deaf community and the dignity of the individual, and promote the social inclusion of deaf people.

This Congress believes that the human right to "respect for private and family life" and "liberty and security" (particularly for people in mental distress) should include having access to health services, consultations and information in the deaf person's language of his/her choice.

This Congress calls upon the European Commission, the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers as well as the Council of Europe to encourage member states to recognise that health information must be made accessible in the deaf patient's own language, to enable all to fully participate in decisions related to their own health including prevention, diagnosis and treatment.

This Congress calls upon the European Commission, the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers as well as the Council of Europe to do all that is possible, to ensure that member states recognise that accessible communication is absolutely essential to obtaining informed consent to all forms of treatment.

Informed consent is vital in any situation when an individual may be harmed by losing his/her right to liberty if consent was not obtained in a language accessible to the deaf person, particularly in the case of voluntary or compulsory admission to psychiatric care.

This Congress calls upon each country to update their Mental Health legislation, to include mandatory requirements for appropriate and effective communication support to be provided at no expense to the patient at the time of admission or as soon as practicable thereafter within a maximum of 72 hours.

Signed on behalf of all Congress delegates,

Dr Alexis Karacostas President of ESMHD

ESMHD Executive Director: Bob Clowes, "Daylesford", Stokeinteignhead, Devon, TQ12 4QD, UK

Tel/fax 00 44 1626 873332
E-mail [email protected]
Web site www.esmhd.org

The next edition of the BSMHD Newsletter will be sent out at the end of May 2004. The deadline for sending articles is 20th May. Please send by email to: [email protected]

BSMHD, Westwood Park, London Road, Little Horkesley, Colchester, CO6 4BS
Tel 01206 274075 Text 01206 274076 Fax 01206 274077
Email: [email protected]
Website: www.bsmhd.org.uk

Registered Charity No. 1057135.

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