Implementing recommendations for anti-racism and anti-discrimination in healthcare

The NCCMH were commissioned by the NHS Race and Health Observatory (NHS RHO) to develop an anti-racist implementation strategy and model to help organisations reduce structural inequality in healthcare.

The NHS RHO is an independent organisation hosted by the NHS Confederation, which seeks to close the gap in racial and ethnic inequalities affecting patients, communities and healthcare workers from minoritised ethnic backgrounds.

The NHS RHO has focused on bringing together the evidence base on health inequalities with other organisations and turning this into policy and recommendations for change. The NCCMH were asked to design a model that could be used to translate the NHS RHO’s recommendations into action to influence health inequalities in a number of areas in health, not only mental health.

The implementation model, which takes the form of a Toolkit, was co-produced with subject matter experts, people with lived experience, key stakeholders and RHO board members, through a series of design workshops, interviews and focus groups.

The resulting Toolkit has a step-by-step approach to implementation, taking the user through from forming a steering group right through to evaluation. It can be used in other areas of healthcare, including maternity services.

The evidence and activities that were used to inform the Toolkit can be found in a Supplementary Report, which was co-produced with people with lived experience. The report presents the findings from a review of the literature, the design workshops and the interviews and focus groups, and can be downloaded below:

A Readiness Assessment Tool, for implementing anti-racism recommendations, and a Recommendations Tracker Template can be downloaded below:

If you have any questions, please contact nccmh@rcpsych.ac.uk.