MHWORXDOTCOM.WORDPRESS.COM - Key Persons
The contribution of Douglas Holmes to mental health services in Australia started in 1992 when he was diagnosed with Bipolar Affective Disorder.
The TheMHS conference in Brisbane in 1996 inspired him to change mental health services so that other consumers could have a better recovery journey than he and his family. He became a member of the NSW Consumer Advisory Group Mental Health inc. (NSW CAG) from 1997 to 2000, and a founding member of the Australian Mental Health Consumer Network from 1997. He became the NSW CAG's Executive Officer from 2000 till 2006. His goal was to embed consumer participation at the core of mental health services in NSW.
Douglas was awarded the TheMHS Exceptional Achievement in 2014 the award states ‘The awards represents an acknowledgement of an exceptional contribution, the results of which will flow on to enhance the mental health and wellbeing of all.' On Douglas Certificate TheMHS included the following words: ‘This award is for recognition of ‘unswerving dedication to the betterment of services to support consumer wellbeing; for extraordinary determination to ask questions and seek out answers; for outstanding expertise, freely given, with a "can do" attitude whether it be for national policy or a local art group.'
Since 2006 Douglas has worked at St Vincent's Hospital as the Mental Health Consumer Participation Officer to put the policies he has worked on into action.
In November 2016 Douglas retired from the O'Brien Centre at St Vincent's Hospital after over 10 year service. He now heads up MH=worx.
Douglas has served on a number of committees and boards of leading state and national mental health organisations including:
NEAMI National website
Hearing Voices Network NSW website
Mental Health Recovery Network Facebook
Inner City Super Group website
Oz Voices website
Callan Park Peers website
Volunteers at Justice Action website
He has also has been involved with
Michael Poynder became involved in mental health recovery work in 2008 after a serious mental health episode in 2006.
Until 2006 he was a senior property lawyer and a special counsel with one of Australia's leading law firms. In that role he worked on some of the most significant property transactions in Australia at the time.
From 2008 to 2012 he prepared reports for St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney on eight of its medical units, including its homeless outreach and mental health inpatient units. The reports were prepared using the Picker Institute method of patient care evaluation, involving interviews of at least 10 former patients from each unit, examining eight specified dimensions of care. Here is a link to the ‘Patient Journey' methodology.
He has provided and continues to provide mentoring services to patients in the Long Bay Forensic Hospital and Morisset Psychiatric Hospital.