Psychological treatment access and outcomes for black and minority ethnic (BME) sexual minority adults with depression or anxiety

Sexual minority adults (e.g. those who are lesbian, gay or bisexual) have higher rates of depression and anxiety than heterosexuals. Minority stress theory proposes that this is because of sexual minorities experiencing increased stigma and discrimination. Furthermore, sexual minority adults can fear or experience stigma from health professionals, which could affect treatment access or outcomes. Those who also have minority ethnicity may be even more likely to anticipate or experience stigma. This project will investigate treatment access and outcomes in primary care psychological therapies services by black and minority ethnic (BME) sexual minority adults with depression or anxiety. Participants will be interviewed about their treatment experiences and these interviews will be analysed for themes. Existing NHS data from psychological therapies services will be used to investigate treatment access and outcomes. The results of these studies will inform the development of an outreach programme aimed at improving access to primary care psychological therapies services for BME sexual minority adults. This project will be a collaboration with Talking Therapies Southwark, an Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) service at South London and Maudsley NHS Trust. The NHS partners will provide access to a large clinical dataset and training in community outreach methods.