No Barriers Here© and people excluded by identity, culture, ethnicity race (ICER)
A project funded by NHS Charities Together will improve care at the end of life for communities within the Black Country. The Mary Stevens Hospice is partnering with Dudley Group NHS Foundation Trust on a new No Barriers Here© project and research study working in co-production with people who may experience inequalities due to identity, culture, ethnicity or race.
The two-year project will work with people from ethnic minority communities to develop and deliver art-based advance care planning workshops to create conversations, so providers of end of life and palliative care have a greater awareness of culturally sensitive issues. This will feed into future practice and strategies, so services are better suited to the communities’ needs.
More than a quarter (26 per cent) of the population of the Black Country is from ethnic minority origins, particularly from the Indian sub-continent and the Caribbean. The national average is nine per cent. There are also significant Polish, Somali and traveller communities, plus refugees and asylum seekers. About four percent of Black Country households have no one who has English as their main language. The Mary Stevens Hospice has recruited an ethnic minority community worker, Elisha Frimpong, who will work alongside partners to reach out and engage with the diverse Dudley community and raise awareness of palliative and end of life services and the No Barriers Here© project.
