In-depth Analysis of Qualitative Interviews for the Deciding Together Consultation

Deciding Together is a public consultation by the NHS Newcastle Gateshead Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) which sought the views of local mental health services users and carers on the different ways specialist mental health services could be arranged. The CCG also gathered feedback from mental health professionals and service providers around the best ways to arrange services in the future. The variety of approaches used in this wider work included surveys, focus groups, in-depth interviews and the presentation of a series of scenarios to service users and carers. On behalf of Newcastle Gateshead CCG Northumbria University undertook work to design a tool and use it to conduct in-depth interviews. This report focusses on these in-depth interviews which captured the lived experience of both mental health service users and carers.