New crisis café will open in the Lincoln Green area of Leeds on Saturday 19th November 2016.
The new crisis café is funded by North Leeds CCG from regional NHS England Vanguard money, as West Yorkshire is a vanguard for crisis and urgent care. The Leeds Crisis and Urgent Care Steering Group has developed the idea for a crisis café, along with colleagues from across the region. Crisis cafes provide a safe place for people in crisis to go and to prevent avoidable attendances at A&E.
The Leeds Hope and Wellbeing Café is a partnership between Leeds Survivor Led Crisis Service and Touchstone (who will be leading the project), the café is funded as a 20 month pilot and will run on Saturday, Sunday and Monday nights, 6pm-midnight.
Complementing the crisis service at Dial House, the café will be located near St James’s Hospital in Lincoln Green, with the aim of diverting people from avoidable visits to A&E. Building on the work of the Touchstone Winter Wellbeing Café, the new project will reach out to some of the vulnerable people who congregate in the area and will also work closely with A&E staff, including the crisis team, to take direct referrals of people who have turned up at A&E but don’t require medical intervention.
Kimberley Saggu, Community Development Worker at Touchstone, has been appointed as the Manager. Kimberley will be joined by 3 Crisis Support Workers employed by Touchstone and 1 Crisis Support Worker, employed by LSLCS, in a more specialist crisis role, to support Kimberley in developing the practice of the crisis café.
For more information about this exciting new project, contact kimberleys@touchstonesupport.org.uk
