NEWS: Healthy Minds, Healthy Communities CHEX Conference 2022 Reflection

Reflections from the Healthy Minds, Healthy Communities CHEX Conference 2022

Earlier this month CHEX were delighted to bring together 80 attendees online for the latest annual conference. The day was a chance to explore the role of community-led health in supporting good mental health, and it was great to have so many people along offering their experiences and ideas.

Brilliantly chaired by Stephanie-Anne Harris, Manager of Edinburgh Community Health Forum, we were very lucky to have two fantastic presentations from Shruti Jain, Chair of the Board at Saheliya; and Heidi Tweedie, Director of Moray Wellbeing Hub.

As well as being a Director and Champion of Moray Wellbeing Hub, Heidi is also the Social Movement and Enterprise Lead, and relished the opportunity to share CHIME as a way to create, and measure, Wellbeing. She said “I am delighted to see that what people found meaningful includes CHIME so prominently. I’m thankful for the invite by CHEX to let me share how we use the framework here in Moray, and internally at Moray Wellbeing Hub as Champions. We are keen to support other Moray partners to understand the approach and implement it. It’s part of the Discover Pathways to Wellbeing online tool, how we hold safe spaces, even a first aid tool… not just our evaluation materials.”

Both presentations offered valuable insights into the importance of supporting people in inclusive and empowering ways – and how both organisations do just that.

The conference then broke into extend breakout discussions where participants would dive into some key topics related to community-led health and mental wellbeing:

• You’re on Mute: Exploring experiences of mental health and wellbeing in lockdown
• Resourcing community-led approaches to mental health
• What is meaningful engagement? Co-production, peer-led and community-led mental
• Health Issues in the Community (HIIC) and Mental Health

You can read more about our workshops here

To finish up, we asked everyone to share some of their thoughts through Mentimetre by asking them ‘What had sparked your fire from today’s conference?’

We’d like to say a big thank you to our chair, speakers and excellent workshop contributors and of course all of the attendees who showed up and made the day such a success.