The NHS has gone mental!

But an NHS project based on research by Leeds University is “showing some individual signs of success”. Those behind the therapy say many Muslims do not get help because of stigma attached to mental illness.

Samia, who is in her late 40s, has struggled with depression and is taking part in the project.

“I just felt like I had to constantly keep myself strong and put on a brave face. Deep inside I was actually broken,” she says, “When I actually fell apart, when I was at my lowest, I felt that there was something that I might have done to upset Allah, which is God.”

Lead researcher Dr Ghazala Mir, of the university’s Leeds Institute of Health Sciences, says this is a common concern among Muslims, who are under-referred for mental health treatment.

“This stigma does involve the idea that maybe if you need treatment, there might be something wrong with your faith identity in the first place,” she says, “Not only is there under-referral but the outcomes for people who do actually get referred are not as good as the general population.”

NHS data assessing the people accessing psychological therapies found depression can be more chronic for British Muslims, who tend to have lower rates of improvement. The NHS has a statutory duty to provide culturally appropriate care for its patients, but Prof Mir claims it often struggles to do so.

“There are a lot of inconsistencies amongst practitioners about how they interpret culturally appropriate,” she adds.

Dr Mir also believes many therapists are mistaken in not considering faith as part of someone’s culture. “We know that in Muslim populations people can get quicker results from faith-sensitive therapies that have been tested elsewhere in the world. They tend to use religion as a coping resource more than people in other religious groups.

Dr Mir has helped to create a new treatment, based on an existing form of cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) called behavioural activation. Following a successful pilot involving 20 patients, it is being provided by the NHS via a mental health charity in Leeds.