Mental Health Advice Team

Advice and reasonable adjustments for students with long-term mental health conditions.

The Mental Health Advice Team supports students living with ongoing mental health challenges that meet the Equality Act definition of a disability (a diagnosed condition that has a substantial long-term impact on your life and studies).*

We can help you build strategies to stay well so you can navigate the demands of university life and enjoy and succeed during your time at Oxford Brookes University. Depending on your needs, we can work with you to produce an Inclusive Support Plan to set out any ‘reasonable adjustments’ you may be entitled to.

You can contact us before you join Oxford Brookes or at any time after your course has started.

*If you’re not sure if this applies to you, please get in touch and we can advise.

Mental Health Advice Team photo — We are (L to R): Ellen Publicover and Freya Startup (advisers) at the front; Kate Owen (adviser), Susannah Lloyd (manager) and Esther Salmaniw (administrator) at the back.

Access the support you need

Start a conversation with us. Fill in our mental health self-referral form and we will contact you within 3 working days.

If you have already been in contact or have an adviser with the MHAT team or Inclusive Support team, you do not need to complete the self-referral form again - instead please email the team.

If you have any trouble accessing the form or need any support completing the form, contact us.

Self-referral form

How we can support you

What we mean by support is to:

explore and build on the strategies you have developed to stay well and to manage the symptoms of your condition - be they variable or constant - so you can engage with university life
signpost self-help resources and agencies. These may provide further strategies, and possibly offer therapeutic activities and community support
help you access further medical support if needed - whether this is about information on crisis, and community-based services, or referral to specialist NHS provision
enable you to engage with us for as long as we need to put things in place
review what else is needed if things change, or to check- in periodically if we agree this would be helpful.

If you are eligible for Disabled Students’ Allowance (DSA) (for home students), we can advise on the process so that you are accessing the correct entitlements and support for you, e.g. accessing mentoring. Please do get in touch with us to discuss this.

We will support you with advice for your next steps and help you to plan ahead when possible. We won't tell you what to do, but we'll ask you the right questions to help you think about what you'll need. We'll work together so you can address any issues or barriers so you have the best chance to fulfill your academic potential and live independently while at Oxford Brookes.

What you can expect

We will:

Work with you to understand how we may support you in your academic journey.
Ask you to provide supporting information about yourself (i.e medical evidence) to ensure fairness and consistency to all students in making formal adjustments, such as coursework extensions, and extra time in exams. If this is difficult to access, please speak to us about it.
We may also be able to recommend solutions for specific situations - e.g. making your teaching staff aware that you are fearful or anxious about presentations and that you may require support to develop confidence in delivering these.
Liaise with others across the University, and with external agencies where appropriate, while always striving for you to be at the centre, and in control of what is communicated.
Be available to meet and discuss with you when there is a change or when something needs specific attention or review.
We have a team approach; while you may see the same adviser more than once and have a named adviser, it means other colleagues may see you at times when your named advisor is not available, and these colleagues will have access to notes of previous contact and will be happy to support you.
Work to ensure you are safe and fit to be studying at University, so we will support you if you are struggling, and explore options to get things back on track, however we may need to consider with you whether taking some time out (ATW) might be the best approach in order to prioritise your health and wellbeing. Many students do need to do this sometimes, and are able to resume and complete their courses successfully.
If serious concerns are raised about your health /safety, we will always attempt to contact you first, but in extreme circumstances, we may need to contact others (e.g. a named contact, or your GP,) to alert them.

We will not:

Make formal reasonable adjustments for mental health issues which are not deemed to be long-term, as this is not the purpose of the Equality Act. However, we will link you to other sources of advice and support, or other routes which may be helpful to you (e.g. exceptional circumstances).
Provide advice on finances, medical needs, housing rights, or course-specific information (but we can signpost you to places and colleagues that do, in particular Student Support Coordinators and Brookes Union Advice Service).
Offer a drop-in service or immediate/frequent/regular contact. We will always be clear about the purpose of ongoing work with you, and we will make you aware of other services you can contact in a crisis situation or out of hours.
Substitute for other processes, e.g. Occupational Health assessments for professional practice-based courses. In particular, according to the conditions of admission to these programmes, you are responsible for disclosing to faculty any health issues that might (even temporarily) have a bearing on your ability to operate safely in the clinical environment, where patient safety is paramount.
Provide personal care, daily living skills and other support not related to student life (but can signpost you to more appropriate support).
Diagnose or provide medical treatment.

FAQs

Who are we?

The Mental Health Advice Team is made up of 3 Mental Health Advisers, the Mental Health Manager and an Administrator.

You might have a named adviser, meaning you have contact with the same adviser multiple times, or you might just see us once.

You can get in touch with us at any point during your studies.

If you have a named adviser you can email them directly.
If you don't have a named adviser, you aren't sure who that is, or if they aren't available, you can contact the team at mentalhealthadvice@brookes.ac.uk and another member of the team will get back to you.

What do we do?

Our main focus is on how your mental health might affect your studies. For students with long-term mental health difficulties that would be considered a disability under the Equality Act 2010, we might put in place adjustments via an Inclusive Support Plan (ISP) and we can review these adjustments if your needs change.

Sometimes formal adjustments aren't possible, and if that is the case we will offer to help you think about strategies to work your way through times when you may be experiencing difficulties day to day, and identify other sources of support. If you have specific accommodation needs relating to a disability (whether mental health or something else), we can talk about the options with you, and if necessary make recommendations of reasonable adjustments to the Accommodation Bureau.

If you are linked to specialist mental health services in your home area, you may want to consider a ‘transfer of care’ to Oxfordshire, although some services may not be available ‘like for like’, so please discuss with your GP who can contact the Brookes Medical Centre.

We aren't a crisis service, though we can point you towards services that provide crisis support. If serious concerns are raised about your health / safety , we will always attempt to contact you first, but in extreme circumstances, we may need to contact others (for instance, your GP or emergency contact) to alert them.

What should I do if I can't attend an appointment?

Let us know as soon as you can. You can either email the adviser directly, or you can email mentalhealthadvice@brookes.ac.uk.

If you miss an appointment and we haven't heard from you, in most cases we will contact you to check in and see if you want to reschedule.

If we have reason to think you might be at risk and we can't get hold of you, we might flag a concern to our colleagues in Halls or the Welfare team on a discreet and ‘need to know’ basis (i.e the minimum of discussion about you, without you). If we have no reason to think you are at risk, we will close your case, but keep details for future reference, should you get back in touch.

Would you ever get in touch with my emergency contact?

All students are required to have an emergency contact listed. In rare circumstances, we may need to get in touch with them. Your emergency contact might be contacted if:

there is a situation involving serious concerns regarding your health (mental and/or physical) and/or safety, where repeated attempts to contact you have been unsuccessful
the level of risk to your health (mental and/or physical) and/or safety necessitates sharing information with your knowledge but without your consent.

Each situation is evaluated individually. Your emergency contact will only be contacted with authorisation from a senior staff member at the director level or their appointed representative. Decisions about whether to contact an emergency contact would be made in line with Student Support Services Confidentiality and Information Sharing Policy.

Will the University be told if I go to A&E for my mental health?

If you go to A&E for mental health related reasons, you might be seen by the Emergency Department Psychiatric Service (EDPS).

If you tell them that you are an Oxford Brookes student, they will ask whether you consent to them sending a copy of their report to the University. If you agree, their report will be sent to the Student Welfare and Support Advice Team. If you don't give consent, they won't share the report with us.

How to contact us

When you contact us the first time, we will

acknowledge the information you have shared with us within 3 working days and provide information about crisis services if you need to access these
offer contact with one of the team, either for a full assessment of your needs at university or for an initial meeting to consider the options for mental health support
we may contact you briefly (usually by phone) to ask for further information, to clarify something you have shared with us, or if we have immediate concerns that you may be at risk.