Supported Reporting of Lived Experience: Facilitating Writing/Publication of People in Recovery

1. Supported Reporting of Lived Experience:Facilitating Writing/Publication of People in Recovery • Paolo ScottiCanadian Mental Health Association, Toronto, Ontario, Canada* • Abraham (Rami) Rudnick, MD, PhD, CPRP Departments of Psychiatry and Philosophy University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada** *Email: pscotti@cmha-toronto.net **Email: arudnic2@uwo.ca

2. Disclosure • No identified conflict of interests.

3. Objectives • Discuss the importance and process of supported reporting of first person accounts of lived experience. • Begin to formulate (or help facilitate) first person accounts of lived experience. • Learn collaborative skills so that content experts and process experts can work together in reporting first person accounts of lived experience. • Have hope and belief that personal stories have a positive impact on the persons reporting the stories and on those attending to them.

4. Method • Didactic interactive presentation with powerpoint and its handouts. • Exercise in pairs and group debriefing. • Reference to presenters’ related published work (Rudnick et al, In press; Scotti, 2009).

5. Outline • Welcome and introduction. • Personal illustration of supported reporting (antecedents, events, experiences and possible future directions of writing and publishing about lived experience). • Process description of supported reporting (concepts, steps, enablers and challenges of facilitating writing and publishing about lived experience). • Guided exercise in pairs (expressing lived experiences – background with focus, situation, related past and/or present feelings, thoughts and behaviors – and actively listening to it). • Debriefing with all learners together (on volunteer basis). • Q&A.

6. Introduction • Self-reporting of lived experience by people in recovery (such as in the form of first person accounts, which are brief and somewhat focused self-reports) is important because: 1. it may empower the persons reporting their lived experience. 2. it may enhance learning and empathy of other people in recovery and of other stakeholders, such as significant others, service providers, trainees, researchers, and policy makers.

7. Introduction (continued) • Reporting such first person accounts faces challenges, such as: 1. disclosure concerns, e.g., re discrimination. 2. inexperience re writing and publishing by people with lived experience. 3. lack of easy access to relevant guidance and to publishing of people with lived experience. • This workshop primarily addresses the latter 2 sets of challenges, with the aim of enhancing related awareness, knowledge and some basic skills.

8. Personal Illustration of Supported Reporting • Recovery as discovery – a first person account. • Antecedents to supported reporting of recovery as discovery. • Events and experiences (feelings, thoughts and behaviors) in relation to supported reporting – writing and publishing – on recovery as discovery. • Possible future directions in relation to supported reporting (more reporting of lived experience? more – and more detailed – workshops and other ways of facilitating reporting of lived experience? other?).

9. Process of Supported Reporting • Concepts (expressing, writing and reporting; content expertise and process expertise). • Steps (establishing a collaboration; planning the report; writing and (re)submitting the report). • Enablers (as described in the steps). • Challenges (as described in the steps).

10. Guided Exercise (in pairs): Expressing Lived Experience • Background with focus. • Situation. • Related past and/or present feelings, thoughts and behaviors. • Active listening to expressed lived experience. • Debriefing in group.

11. References • Rudnick A, Rofe T, Virtzberg-Rofe D, Scotti P. Supported reporting of first person accounts: assisting people who have mental health challenges in writing and publishing reports about their lived experience. Schizophrenia Bulletin, In press. • Scotti P. Recovery as discovery. Schizophrenia Bulletin, 2009; 35:844-846.