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Sarah - Pyschologist at Rowan Alba's hostels

Sarah - Pyschologist at Rowan Alba's hostels

Sarah - Pyschologist at Rowan Alba's hostels

Wednesday, December 18, 2024

Sarah is a psychologist, employed by NHS Lothian, and working with Rowan Alba across two of their hostels in Edinburgh. Sarah’s post with Rowan Alba is funded by St Martin-in-the-Fields Charity through our Mental Health Fund, which was set up due to feedback from frontline workers across the UK, who let us know that access to mental health support for people experiencing homelessness was a hugely pressing challenge. 

Rowan Alba’s ‘Psychology in Hostels’ project is funded for three years by St Martin’s, meaning that Sarah can provide long-term, targeted mental health support to 45 people with long-term experience of homelessness and trauma.  

“The three year funding really allows for the change to happen. It’s really satisfying because we can see the progress.” 

The project will fill a gap that currently exists in the provision of psychological care to help people who have experienced homelessness and trauma in Edinburgh, prevent repeat homelessness, and reduce demands on other services such as health or housing. This is crucial – in Edinburgh, 34% of homelessness applications cited mental health as a support need in 2020/21. And, 8% of the Scottish population has experienced homelessness at some point in their lives. 

“This works because we’re bringing psychology to where it’s needed. The nice thing about this post is that I’m really embedded here. I’m coming in and I’m getting to know them very gradually – sitting having cups of coffee, playing games with them, maybe going for a walk with them. We’re building trust, and engaging more.” 

Sarah works across two hostels – one for men, and one for women. These hostels are intended to be short-term, temporary accommodation, but due to the current housing crisis in Scotland, residents tend to stay for three years before moving on. From Sarah’s perspective though this is useful, as it means people are in stable environments for three years, giving her the opportunity to build trusting relationships with people do some really productive psychological work.  

And more broadly, as well as providing individual psychological support, the project aims to help Rowan Alba’s hostels be psychologically informed environments. This involves looking at a resident's journey from their arrival at the hostel, to what goes on while they stay, where they live when they leave, and whether staff are supporting them in a trauma-informed way. The project is helping the staff at Rowan Alba to look at kind of the processes they have in place, and making sure the support is meeting the needs of their residents.  

"We've done a training needs analysis of the staff. So we will be making sure that we can roll out a plan of training over the next year, making sure that we're filling any gaps in knowledge, and we've got kind of a range of topics that we're going to be delivering training on.” 

The range of treatment Sarah can offer is broad – from more traditional mental health support, such as therapy, or anxiety management, or working with people who are not in the right place to engage in formal therapy. 

"In these cases, it's about the staff doing the work and using some of the skills they have gained, teaching and helping them. Just nudging the women along in a positive direction, so that we're slowly changing some of their behaviours.” 

Cass Ogilvie, Senior Support Worker at Rowan Alba, said: “My goodness me, it's been absolutely incredible having Sarah and Renee. It’s just really great for the residents as well, because they know that they're able to come and speak to Sarah every Friday, and it's very private, and they get an hour together, and it's just been really helpful. It’s brilliant for them and it’s what they need as well, because sometimes it can be really intimidating for them. Going up to see a counsellor at a doctor's practice leaving the project can be a real challenge. Many of us can just get up and go, we don't really have to think about it. But for the residents, it's really challenging. So, knowing that they don’t have to go anywhere, they can just get their dressing gown on, have a little cup of coffee go downstairs and see Sarah, that has done wonders." 

As Cass highlights, the reason for having Sarah embedded in the hostel environment is removing the barriers to accessing mental-health support for residents. Sarah being available in the residents own homes makes it so much easier for them to get to appointments, as well as removing lengthy waiting lists which can be a huge barrier. 

Cass also said: “It’s helpful for the staff as well, because we have reflective practice every month with the management that then helps us to understand the issues that the residents are having. Then Sarah is able to teach us the best ways to look after the residents, and that has been a massive thing.” 

One of the people Sarah is working with through Rowan Alba is Elvira. Elvira became homeless after a series of difficult and abusive relationships left her without a home and in debt. She has been a resident at Rowan Alba’s hostel for two years, and in that time has made huge strides when it comes to her mental health. Elvira struggles with Complex-PTSD, as a result of past experiences, as well as anxiety. When she first arrived at the hostel, she was so anxious that she could not leave her room due to fear.  She even got scared when a staff member knocked on her door. Over time and with support, she has become more comfortable, and now engages not just with Sarah’s mental health support but with activities with other residents, including cooking for them.  

On the support she has been receiving from Sarah, Elvira said: “I had some things that I needed to work through, and she’s actually helped me through that. I just feel blessed to be here. I feel as though my Complex-PTSD is going to be a bit better that it was before. It’s making me figure out ways to deal with certain situations, and ways to cope, and ways to manage everything that comes with it.”  

On working with Elvira, Sarah said: “With Elvira, the progress is really obvious. I’m able to take her on a psychological journey that I wouldn’t be able to in more mainstream services, because of the pressures of waiting lists and waiting times. The only pressure that she and I have is her moving on from this service.” 

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