In partnership with the Faculty for Homeless and Inclusion Health we are delighted to announce our first International Symposium.  The two day event will take place on 27 and 28 February 2013, at Congress Centre, London WC1B

The theme for the event is ‘Improving the health of the poorest fastest’.  A wide range of speakers will look at homeless health in its broader social and economic context, share international best practice from Europe and the United States, and present examples of the best health services responses to homeless and otherwise severely excluded adults.  The programme includes a large number of workshop sessions enabling delegates to discuss specific issues in more detail.  There are both practical workshops for frontline NHS staff (for example on clients’ housing and benefit entitlements, or the provision of street based health services) and theoretical or more clinically focussed sessions – for example on infection, on brain injury, and on addiction.  Members of the Faculty have helped to draw up the two day programme which includes a strong focus throughout on mental health.  Some of us are particularly looking forward to Chris Scanlon and John Adlam’s presentation ‘Against social exclusion: the Diogenes paradigm’ which presents a new way of thinking about the psychological harms that homeless people so often have to face.

Keynote speakers include from overseas Dr Jim O’Connell, President of the Boston Healthcare for the Homeless; Walter Kamp from the City of Amsterdam and Dublin based Dr Austin O’Carroll; and from the UK Professor Sir Michael Marmot, Professor Steve Field, and Duncan Selby, Chief Executive of Public Health England.

Pathway is delighed to announce that, thanks to funding from the Inclusion Health Unit in the Department of Health, we will be running a supported service user programme to ensure that service users can attend the event and that service users’ voices are heard throughout.  Conference organisers Neil Stewart Associates have taken on the task of running the event. Click here to see the full programme, delegate prices, and booking details.