Safety Planning Together: What We Learned and What’s Next
An update on the safety planning work. Over September and the beginning of October Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust invited service users and carers to help design the questions that would feature in our Safety Plan evaluation. Feedback closed on the 7 October. All responses were read, and the themes and suggested questions were shared at the risk assessment and safety planning project group meeting.
What is a Safety Plan?
A safety plan is a personalised plan developed with an individual (and sometimes their carer or support network) to help keep them safe during times of distress or crisis. They can look different but often cover questions like:
- Things that have caused me to struggle in the past
- Things that make me feel unsafe
- Early warning signs when I start to struggle
- Things I, others, and services can do to help
Themes from the feedback so far
It was clear from responses that safety plans need to be clear and easy to read at the point they are needed. Some people found paper or printed copies that couldn’t be easily updated unhelpful. People wanted to be asked if the safety plan felt specific to them and if it contained everything it needed to. The feedback indicated we need to do more as a Trust to involve carers in these conversations, asking not only if they were involved in safety planning conversations, but whether this helped them support the person they care for.
What next?
The responses and suggested questions have been used to create a survey, which will gather feedback on our current way of safety planning. Whilst we could not use every question suggested, we hope that we have captured the themes of the questions and this comes across in our survey. Thank you to everyone who took the time to give feedback. Please keep an eye out on the Trust website in November for how you can get involved in the next stage of the work.
Page last updated: 28th Oct 2025 9:57am