The importance of shared decision-making for the LGBTQ+ community

"Our shared ambition to improve the lives of LGBT people in Scotland enables us to collaborate far more than to compete."

At its heart, health and social care integration is about ensuring that everyone can enjoy their right to live well with dignity and respect. In line with this, third sector organisation LGBT Health and Wellbeing are exemplary in championing the key principles of integration, such as shared decision-making and collaborative working, for the benefit of the communities they represent.

The charity delivers a range of services and events designed to meet the needs of LGBTQ+ adults across Scotland, including providing mental health services, 1:1 advice and support, counselling, therapeutic groupwork, inclusive spaces, as well as running Scotland’s LGBT Helpline. CEO Mark Kelvin says that working closely and collaborating with others across sectors, the charity can offer the best-possible support to Scotland’s LGBTQ+ community.

“The LGBT sector in Scotland is incredibly collegiate”, Mark says. “We work closely with each other as well as with statutory partners, which includes producing joint applications in competitive tender processes. Whilst there is sometimes a reality that forces us to be ‘competitors’ with each other, our shared ambition to improve the lives of LGBT people in Scotland enables us to collaborate far more than to compete.”

The organisation offers tailored services that are designed to meet the needs of LGBTQ+ refugee and asylum seekers, transgender people, ‘older’ people (50+), LGBT families, and LGBT carers. They also support the delivery of volunteer-led social programmes, including various sports, crafting, outdoor activities, music, and more. Natalie Summers, Head of Income Generation and Engagement, adds that because of this, the charity has been able to make a difference to the lives of many across Scotland.

“77% of people attending our programs and events have shared that they feel less isolated”, Natalie says. “As well as delivering LGBTQ+ specific services, the charity aims to support ‘mainstream’ services to become inclusive, which includes offering training, as well as our National Policy Lead facilitating the community’s response to consultations with the Scottish Government, the NHS and other bodies.”

By sharing decision-making and collaborating with the LGBTQ+ community to ensure their experiences can truly shape policy, LGBT Health and Wellbeing work in partnership across sectors to make key connections, overcome barriers, and transform the lives of LGBTQ+ people in Scotland.

“Working in partnership has been key to our expansion”, Natalie says. “We’ve gone through many challenges as a community, and by uniting and working together, we have fought for and won the rights we have today. But the work continues to ensure we keep making progress towards a fair, inclusive and progressive Scotland where all LGBTQ+ people can thrive.”

Despite a working relationship with the statutory sector, Mark adds that “funding is increasingly scarce and the cost of delivering services is rising”, meaning that the charity is required to effectively subsidise statutory service delivery in order to mitigate the impact of health inequalities experienced by the community.

“The organisation has a proud history of working with local councils, IJBs, and HSCPs, but we are living in challenging times”, Mark says. “Just this month we received notification of a 10% reduction to committed funding two weeks short of the new financial year. Whilst the wider economic situation means that these decisions are understandable, what is more difficult to understand is the lack of communication and consultation that can occur around such decisions, so we welcome more communication between statutory funding bodies and the third sector to allow for better planning and service provision.”

In line with this, LGBT Health and Wellbeing are committed to working with the community and across the sectors to ensure that LGBTQ+ people can collaborate on decisions that affect them, whilst striving for an equal Scotland where sexuality or gender expression does not negatively impact on a person’s health and wellbeing.

You can learn more about the work of LGBT Health and Wellbeing here: www.lgbthealth.org.uk