The Recovery Team is a comprehensive community rehabilitation and recovery service for people aged 18-65 with severe and enduring mental illness, who have complex needs.

Recovery means different things to different people – it is very personal, Recovery is an approach that promotes empowerment.  Generally speaking, it is a way of living a satisfying, hopeful and meaningful life, even if you are living with the limitations caused by illness.

Who are we and what do we do?

Gloucester Recovery Team is a team made up of different professions including mental health nurses, community support workers, psychiatrists, social workers, occupational therapists and physiotherapy staff with a common aim of supporting recovery in individuals in the Gloucester locality who are living with complex or severe mental illness.  The team works very closely with the Complex Psychological Interventions service (CPI) both in work with patients and in participating in supportive spaces including twice weekly reflective practice and structured clinical management supervision fortnightly.

The team operates from Pullman Place, which is near the centre of the city – opposite Gloucestershire Royal Hospital and around the corner from Wootton Lawn Hospital, which is the trust’s adult mental health inpatient unit.  This makes closer liaison and visiting patients who are in hospital much easier.  Pullman Place is also the home for many other Gloucester community health services including Crisis Resolution and Home Treatment Team (CRHTT), Assertive Outreach Team (AOT), Mental Health Intermediate Care Team (MHICT) and Rapid Response which supports better cross-working. 

The team is open during core hours Monday – Friday; 9am – 5pm (excluding bank holidays) and supports a flexible working approach with options of flexible working hours and hybrid office and home working.  This acknowledges the need for staff to maintain a good work-life balance.

A day within the team is varied like the various difficulties and experiences of those it serves. ‘We are not designated as a ‘specialist’ service in the fact we do have exclusions for particular diagnoses or sets of problems.” explains team manager Abi Kingsbury.  “But we are specialists in working collaboratively with people with varied symptoms and using different approaches to support recovery journeys and this means team members become highly skilled and flexible clinicians.”  Team working is an essential part of offering holistic treatment and is also key in supporting staff working with people with complex problems.

Clinicians new to community working coming from an inpatient setting can find the idea of lone working daunting.  Extensive support during induction is offered which allows consolidation of skills and confidence and an emphasis on joint working and multidisciplinary team decision making is the ethos.   

Here is what members of our staff say about working in our recovery teams:

• “I’m a  mental health nurse by background but I work in the psychological therapies part of  the Recovery service. We provide direct one to one work with people but also do a lot of co-working with the wider team, around consultation, supervision and helping to think through aspects of  the care  we deliver and the systems we work in. I have worked locally  in mental health for over 30 years, and I can say without hesitation that I have never been around a harder working, kind, skilled and supportive bunch of  people than my Gloucester Recovery colleagues.  If doing good work with good people  in a challenging and diverse environment is your thing, you should probably put us on your bucket list”
• “I’ve recently joined Gloucester Recovery team and I’ve worked in a variety of places over the years.  I can honestly say I’ve been made to feel the most welcome here in this team. I feel I’m part of the team already even a few weeks in.  Colleagues are friendly and caring.  Nothing is too much trouble.  There is a palpable sense that everyone is working towards the same goal of delivering the best patient care we can whilst looking after each other along the way.”
• “I was fortunate enough to be allocated Gloucester Recovery Team as my first nursing placement more than 10 years ago, and I enjoyed it so much that I vowed I would return, which I soon did! Working in Gloucester Recovery Team is a privilege; it enables us to walk alongside people with serious mental illness through the ups and downs of their recovery journey, supporting them to reach their goals and understand what matters to them. There is ample opportunity for learning, development and reflection and the MDT are friendly and supportive. We have the opportunity to build therapeutic relationships in the community with our patients, carry out assessments, take duty calls, facilitate clinics, deliver medical, social and psychological treatments and support facilitation of groups. We are part of the Locality Community Partnership, building closer links with primary care, social care and the voluntary care sector, aiming to ensure patients receive holistic care in the right place at the right time. We work closely with our Complex Psychological Therapies Team and have access to Reflective Practice twice per week, which helps us to continually improve the way we work and the quality of care we deliver.”

You can also watch Tom and Angela talk about their roles.