Reducing health inequalities in care
Supported by Annual delivery plan 1: Delivering Great Care
Health Inequalities Strategic Plan
Reducing health inequalities remains central to improving care. During the year, we launched our Health Inequalities Strategic Plan (2025–2030), setting out a clear approach to reducing inequalities in access, experience and outcomes across mental health services.
The strategy focuses on improving culturally responsive care, strengthening community partnerships and making better use of data to target support towards communities experiencing poorer outcomes.
As part of the Health Inequalities Strategic Plan, we introduced a new Health Equity Assessment Tools (HEAT) to support service redesign and reduce inequities across pathways. Two areas have completed the new HEAT, including work focused on improving engagement and continuity of care for high-risk groups, particularly Black men, and improving access and consistency within crisis care pathways.
As part of the Health Inequalities Strategic Plan, we established a new Health Inequalities Advisory Panel, bringing together community organisations, partners and people with lived experience to help shape delivery of the strategy.
The panel has highlighted the importance of data transparency, stronger engagement with minority communities across our five boroughs, partnership working and improving access through community-based services. These insights are helping shape how the strategy is delivered.
Improving cultural capability
Improving cultural capability is an important part of reducing health inequalities and delivering more inclusive care. Following a successful pilot, we rolled out cultural capability training for frontline staff, co-produced with people with lived experience, carers and family members.
The training focused on cultural awareness, anti-racist practice, psychological safety and culturally responsive care. Early feedback showed:
- 90% reported being more anti-racist in practice
- 67% felt more confident challenging discrimination at work
- 67% included cultural considerations in care planning
- 56% adapted their communication style.
Family Placement Scheme
We continued developing more culturally informed alternatives to hospital admission through our Family Placement Scheme. The scheme recruits and trains local host families to provide short-term support in a safe and familiar home environment, particularly for Black African and Caribbean communities who are disproportionately affected by restrictive care. During the year, two families joined the scheme, and two patients were supported through placements.
Reducing restrictive practice
Reducing restrictive practice remained a priority, particularly for Black and Asian patients, who are disproportionately affected by restrictive interventions nationally. Actions included strengthening peer support and lived experience roles following incidents involving use of force, improving shared decision-making and introducing culturally informed approaches to care planning and debriefing.
This work contributed to reductions in restrictive practice and length of stay for Black and Asian inpatients. We also embedded the Peer-to-Peer Debrief Service within Adult Acute Care. This peer-led model provides voluntary support following use of force and has shown positive impact on emotional recovery, advocacy and patient experience, particularly for Black and Asian patients.
Improved engagement with underserved communities
We also continued work to improve engagement with communities who are underserved in mental health services. Talking Therapies teams across South West London developed approaches tailored to local communities, including strengthened partnerships with Korean communities in Kingston, culturally tailored workshops in Sutton, improved translated materials and language support in Richmond, and Global Majority Champions within Wandsworth services.
Alongside this, four psychology and psychotherapy quality improvement projects focused on improving equity in access and outcomes, including increasing access to psychology support for people from Global Majority backgrounds and people with psychosis.
The Forensic Intellectual and Neuro disability (FIND) Service also expanded during the year to address inequalities affecting forensic patients with learning disabilities and autistic people, who are more likely to be placed far from home and remain in restrictive settings for longer. New specialist FIND teams improved care coordination and supported more people to move closer to home and into less restrictive care.
Public body duties and accountability
As a public body, we have a responsibility to deliver services fairly, lawfully and in ways that improve outcomes for all the communities we serve. This includes meeting the Public Sector Equality Duty under section 149 of the Equality Act 2010. We must have due regard to the need to eliminate discrimination, advance equality of opportunity and foster good relations.
Health inequalities duties and annual reporting
NHS England’s Statement on Information on Health Inequalities, published under section 13SA of the NHS Act 2006, sets out how relevant NHS bodies, including NHS trusts and foundation trusts, should collect, analyse, use and publish information on inequalities in access, experience and outcomes.
Annual reporting guidance requires NHS bodies to include in their annual reports a review of the extent to which they have exercised their functions consistently with NHS England’s views set out in the statement.
For us, this means demonstrating how information on health inequalities has informed action and improvement. This includes national operational priorities, Core20PLUS5 clinical priorities and the completeness of ethnicity data.
A separate detailed report will be published alongside the Annual Report. This will set out our performance in the specific domains covered by NHS England’s Statement on Information on Health Inequalities.
Looking ahead
Reducing health inequalities will remain a major priority in 2026 — 2027. We will continue implementing our Health Inequalities Strategic Plan, strengthening culturally responsive and anti-racist practice, improving the use of inequalities data and working more closely with communities and partners across South West London.
We will also continue developing alternatives to restrictive care, improving engagement with underserved communities and embedding co-production and lived experience within service improvement. Partnership working with patients, carers, communities and local organisations will remain central to improving outcomes and experience for all the communities we serve.