AD4E allies Platfform: For Mental Health and Social change talk about their vision for a holistic, community approach to ‘mental health.’
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About this event
- Event lasts 2 hours
Our allies Platfform are an organisation committed to social change and to challenging the medicalisation of emotional distress.
Dr Jen Daffin and Dr Zoe Jeffreys join us to discuss their essential work in the community.
From Clinic to Community
The dominant approach to addressing mental health issues is still one that pathologises with an, individualistic and clinically focused approach. But without the resilience, money for transport, or support to attend hospital or clinic appointments our most ‘vulnerable’, especially children, are likely never to make their appointments to tell us how we could do things better. When we understand that our mental health is largely shaped by the social, economic and physical environments in which people are born, live, work, and play it makes no sense to just focus on mental health services. A whole community approach is needed.In this session we would like to share the pilot work we are doing in this area. At Platfform, we are working in partnership to explore how to work in a holistic and social justice focused way.
Dr. Jen Daffin is a Community Clinical Psychologist and the Director of Relational Practice, Policy and Campaigns at Platfform, a mental health and social change charity. With over 15 years of experience in NHS mental health and learning disability services, she is passionate about community and liberation psychology and taking a holistic and social justice approach to mental health.
Jen’s work emphasises understanding mental health through the lens of social injustice, advocating for trauma-informed and compassionate leadership within organisations. She has first-hand experience of the challenges within current systems and strives to create environments that embrace the complexity of human experiences. Jen also coordinators Psychologists for Social Change Cymru.
In her spare time likes to spend time with family, do a bit of downhill biking and trail running too.
Dr. Zoe Jeffreys is a newly qualified Clinical Psychologist who has over 14 years’ experience working both within the NHS and charity sectors. More recently, she has become dedicated to advocating for the need to move beyond the often reactive, individualised clinic model toward community-based strategies that prioritise collaboration, prevention, and liberation.
With a deep commitment to preventative, sustainable, and culturally responsive approaches, Zoe works to address the limitations of traditional clinic-based psychology, which often isolates individuals from their environments, overlooks systemic inequities, and struggles to reach marginalised communities.
Recognising that healing and well-being are deeply interconnected with social, cultural, and environmental contexts, she has recently joined Platfform to lead on the trauma-informed, place-based community projects. Her work here aims to foster collective resilience, empower communities, and promote equitable access to resources. By addressing systemic barriers and focusing on the root causes of distress, Zoe hopes to create sustainable initiatives that cultivate healthier, happier communities.
Through her current work, Zoe is committed to equipping mental health professionals and organisations with the tools to reimagine psychology as a means to drive systemic change and collective healing.
This event will be recorded for dele who can’t attend live