Mental health and MSK

CEO update by Sue Brown
The launch by National Voices of their Ask Me How I Am report got me thinking about mental health. The report highlights many of the issues that ARMA has raised in relation to MSK. Mental health and MSK are not separate. Living with a long term painful condition which restricts your mobility is clearly going to have a psychological as well as a physical impact. Which is why ARMA has made mental health a priority area for our work in the last few years.

Mental health support needs to be easy to access for everyone with a long term MSK condition. For some this will be psychology services, which really need to be integrated into MSK clinics. They are also a scarce resource which can be hard to access with long waiting times. IAPT services can be accessed much more quickly and IAPT for long term conditions has a number of pathways, including chronic pain. I’ve been talking to the NHS England IAPT team about how we can work together to get this more readily available.

Peer support is also incredibly important. The many ARMA patient organisations provide local group, online support and a range of opportunities for people to talk to those who know how it feels because they have a shared experience. It is impossible to overestimate the value of this. Everyone living with an MSK conditions should know how to get in touch with the relevant patient organisations for their condition.

Finally, there is the opportunity to talk to a clinician family member or friend about how your condition impacts on your wellbeing. Speaking about emotional wellbeing is often difficult. When I saw this NRAS film, Behind the Smile I thought it captured the point perfectly. It’s only two minutes long and I would urge everyone involved in supporting or treating people with MSK conditions to watch it. It’s aimed at people living with rheumatoid arthritis, but it also reminds everyone else just how difficult it is for people to say how they are really feeling.

The National Voices report has one very simple message: for all health care practitioners to take every opportunity to ask about emotional wellbeing. It is exactly the same as the conclusion drawn by our mental health roundtable which included the recommendation that “Every healthcare professional with an MSK patient should ask about their emotional/psychological wellbeing at every appointment.”

ARMA will continue to press for a full range of mental health support options for people with MSK conditions. Whatever your role in MSK, please support us in moving this agenda forward.

Read more: other ARMA articles related to mental health.