Keep in touch with us via Facebook and Twitter!
/DDNMagazine @DDNMagazine
Contents
editor’s letter
ON THE COVER
‘We need to
take others
along with us
as we move’
Empowering service users, p6
4 NEWS
Local authorities falling short on naloxone; Home Office green lights drug testing.
6 KEEP ON MOVING: THE DDN CONFERENCE
Round-up from the day’s opening session, ‘Food for Thought’
10 TALKING IT THROUGH
Keep on Moving’s second session, ‘The Big Conversation’ looked at where
service user involvement should go from here.
12 CZAR GAZING
Mike Trace on the treatment system’s failure to inspire.
CENTRE PAGES: END OF LIFE CARE
Special supplement from the Manchester Metropolitan University team on
end of life care for people with problematic substance use and their families.
13 LEGAL LINE
Hope Davis-McCallion on the importance of keeping up to speed with CQC’s
latest revised guidance.
14 INSIGHTFUL STORIES
Keep on Moving’s final session heard personal accounts of gambling addiction,
naloxone and harnessing the power of your past.
18 A NEED TO BE HEARD
Reflections on the conference’s memorable moments.
21 CLINICAL EYE
Nurses have become the ‘fat that can be trimmed’ in many organisations,
says Ishbel Straker.
21 MEDIA SAVVY
The news and the skews in the national media.
DDN is published by
CJ Wellings Ltd,
Romney House,
School Road,
Ashford,
Kent TN27 0LT
t: 0845 299 3429
www.drinkanddrugsnews.com
peakers at the DDN conference embraced the theme ‘Keep on
Moving’. What came out very strongly was that we need to take
others along with us as we move – not just peers and colleagues,
but people who are not in treatment or connected to services.
We know that many drug-related deaths are outside of treatment,
and Rosanna O’Connor of PHE was among those urging us to reach out.
Lord Victor Adebowale said we ‘have to work together like never before’
to reach those at the sharp end of the inverse care law (where those in
need of health and social care the most tend to get it the least).
Mat Southwell made the strong point of calling on the treatment
community to look beyond its doors to the active drug user networks,
because ‘when you engage with us you can interact with all those
people who don’t use treatment’.
Our debate session on forming a service user network
acknowledged that good communication is vital if we are to get
anywhere. As Radha Allen from B3 pointed out, ‘chaotic drug users
aren’t represented in a lot of service user groups’. Throughout the
conference we heard inspirational words and saw the best
networking in action. We heard new ideas and real enthusiasm for
joining up with others to form an active, diverse and representative
network that ‘agrees to disagree’, in the words of Tim Sampey, and
gets everybody on board.
Can we do this? We hope so at DDN, and are ready to support
communications within a service user initiative. As Jacquie Johnston
said, ‘everyone is hardwired for connection’ and this whole diverse
community could be its own strongest asset.
Claire Brown, editor
S
Keep in touch at www.drinkanddrugsnews.com and @DDNmagazine
Editor: Claire Brown
e: [email protected] Subscriptions:
e: [email protected] Cover by Nigel Brunsdon,
nigelbrunsdon.com
Advertising manager:
Ian Ralph
e: [email protected] website:
www.drinkanddrugsnews.com CJ Wellings Ltd does not accept
respon si bility for the accuracy
of state ments made by
contri bu t ors or advertisers.
The contents of this magazine
are the copyright of CJ Wellings
Ltd, but do not necess arily
represent its views, or those of
its partner organisations.
Reporter: David Gilliver
e: [email protected]
Designer: Jez Tucker
e: [email protected]
Website support by
wiredupwales.com
Printed on environmentally
friendly paper by the
Manson Group Ltd
DDN is an independent publication, entirely funded by advertising.
Proud to work in partnership with:
March 2019 | drinkanddrugsnews | 3