The non‐professionally affiliated workforce in mental health ‐ who are these generic mental health workers and where do they fit within a workforce strategy?
| Pages | 4-11 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/17556228200700015 |
| Date | 01 November 2007 |
| Published date | 01 November 2007 |
| Author | Sharon Cuthbert,Thurstine Basset |
| Subject Matter | Health & social care |
4
The non-professionally affiliated workforce
in mental health – who are these generic
mental health workers and where do they
fit within a workforce strategy?
Abstract
This paper gives an overview of the ‘non-
professionally affiliated’ (NPA) workforce in mental
health in relation to their education, training and
development. Some comparison is made with the
current situation for the key professions in mental
health. Weargue that the NPA workforce is an
increasingly significant and important partof the
workforce and that attention needs to be paid to
the construction of an overall development and
qualification pathway for these workers, who
embody many of the strengths of generic mental
health work and have been found to be of great
value to service users and their families.
Key words
mental health workforce; education and training;
development pathways; non-professionally affiliated
workers; new roles and new ways of working
Introduction
The 21st century has seen a major boost to both the status
and number of mental health workers who do not belong
to a specific profession. These workers have come to be
known as ‘non-professionally affiliated’ (NPA) workers in
that they do not have a recognised qualification from the
professions that are most active in mental health –
nursing, occupational therapy, psychiatry, psychology
and social work. Sometimes they are also referred to as
‘unqualified’ although, as we will explore in this paper,
they increasingly do have qualifications. They can also be
called ‘generic’ mental health workers in that they are not
constrained by a specialist role as the professions may be.
The common use of the term ‘unqualified workers’
reflects the historic low status of these workers in mental
health services and, although valued for their direct work
with service users, this rather dismissive category may
suggest that they have been seen as unthreatening to the
established order.Attitudes may be changing, as the
closure of the majority of the large Victorian psychiatric
hospitals in the latter part of the 20th centurywitnessed
an increasing blurring of professional roles, increased calls
for more generic workers and a suggestion that the
different professionals are doing more or less the same job
(Muijen, 1997; SCMH, 1997a; Basset & Corrigan, 2002).
The existence of generic workers and promotion of these
roles may therefore become a challenge to the professions.
The NPAworkforce has recently been boosted by new
workers, such as support, time and recovery(STR)
workers, who are part of the modernisation agenda in
mental health in England. These new roles are currently
receiving considerable attention, but it must be
emphasised that there has always been an extensive NPA
workforce encompassing roles such as residential worker,
day-centre worker, support worker, telephone helpline
worker, health care assistant, home carer, technical
instructor and recreational therapist. These roles
certainly grew considerably as the large hospitals closed.
The roles are in all sectors – in the NHS, social services
and in the voluntary/independent sector as well as in
housing associations.
It is difficult to access accurate data on the total
numbers of NPA workers in the UK for a number of
reasons including the wide range of roles in which they
are employed, the variation in job titles and
different methods for gathering information. For
example, the overview of staff numbers within the NHS in
Sharon Lee Cuthbert, Independent Training and Development Consultant
Thurstine Basset, Independent Training and Development Consultant
The Journal of Mental Health Training, Education and Practice Volume 2 Issue 3 November 2007 © Pavilion Journals (Brighton) Ltd
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