ACACIA: The Australian Capital Territory Consumer and Carer Mental Health Research Unit, at the Australian National University was established to address research questions important to the lived-experience community and provide opportunities for people with lived-experience to contribute to these research priorities.

Celebrating its 10th year in 2023, ACACIA embedded two research interns with lived-experience of mental ill-health as either a consumer or carer, and without an academic research background into the team. The challenge for the team was to follow-up two of the original research priorities identified in 2013 relating to the use of language and labels in mental health.

This is the story of one of the interns, a carer: their motivation to apply for the position; the growth and development of their skills; what they learnt from engaging with the lived-experience participants about themselves as a researcher, and the impacts of language and labels on the individuals who receive them.

There is an assumption that communication and language create a common ground of understanding, but listening to lived-experience tells us otherwise. When speaking to or about each other, probably always and especially when speaking about peoples’ mental health we all need to consider “how the words land”.

Early engagement, with people who use drugs (PWUD), and access to treatment, can assist in minimising complications arising from substance use. Research has found that drug stigma is common across healthcare settings and this is a significant barrier to patients’ access to treatment (Van Boeke, et al., 2013).

Education alone is often ineffective in producing sustained changes in attitudes and reducing stigma. Combining training, hospital-supported anti-stigma policies, and social marketing, may be more effective in reducing discriminatory practices, compared to education alone. Alcohol and Other Drugs (AOD) educators at one Melbourne hospital applied a multi-level intervention design to reduce drug-stigma and discrimination.

Staff were supported to change their language about substance use, replacing stigmatising language with person-first language. Interventions showed improved staff awareness of destigmatising language and increases in staff empathy towards patients with substance use disorders.

This presentation will share our experience of co-producing a multi-level drug-stigma reduction intervention that coupled education and with social marketing approaches to influence organisational culture and attitudes towards PWUD.

Despite considerable advances in awareness and understanding, public stigma is still a significant source of distress and harm in Australia.

Mass media has a major influence on public stigma, with evidence showing media portrayal of negative stereotypes encourages and reinforces stigma whilst positive stories of recovery can be powerfully de-stigmatising. The global 2022 Lancet Commission emphasized that media-based interventions for stigma-reduction were promising but more understanding of how, where and when they could be used was needed.

SANE StigmaWatch was established in 1997 as one of the first programs in the world to support positive media representation of mental illness. Working with Mindframe and the University of Melbourne, the StigmaWatch research program is building the evidence base around media-based stigma reduction and identifying new areas where intervention can have a positive impact.

Research to date has quantified the overall impact of the StigmaWatch program, explored the experiences of the lived experience community when engaging with media and investigated the understanding and engagement of media professionals with stigma reduction programs.

Current research is investigating the prevalence and impact of stigmatizing content on news-based social media sites and reviewing court reporting with the aim of developing resources supporting journalists and judicial workers.

The media remains a significant source of information about mental health and can considerably influence public attitudes[1,2]. Elite sportspeople are significant role models for young people, and important figures broadly in Australian culture[3]. However, little is known about journalists’ attitudes, experiences, and training needs for reporting on mental ill-health and suicide in high profile athletes and coaches[4]. The current study seeks to fill this gap. A total of 81 Australian journalists (43 women; 38 men) completed a cross-sectional online survey from a link sent directly to their email. The email list was generated in a recent previous study from publicly available resources (N=4408 emails; response rate~1.8%). Participants were aged 22-76 years (M=22.0, SD=13.8), and had 1-50 years of experience in journalism (M=22.1, SD=13.0). Many (48%) had personal experience of mental ill-health: either themselves (21%), a family member/someone they care for (20%), or both (7%). Respondents had diverse opinions on the media’s responsibility when reporting mental health and suicide in athletes, some believing they had an important role in reducing stigma. Almost half respondents had never received training on how to report on mental ill-health and suicide. Further training resources are likely to be beneficial, especially with a focus on sportspeople.

So many rural and remote communities feel forgotten, often because they are. Unlike their metro counterparts, they can rarely access the services and support they need, when they need it. Break the Cycle, a bunch of committed mental health workers with reasonable (not great) cycling abilities, ride through towns and communities to show them the support is right there, in the form of friends and neighbours.

In 2018, a group of committed and foolhardy staff and community members from Wagga Wagga and surrounds set off on bikes for a 560km journey across the Murrumbidgee, raising awareness and providing support to small, rural communities who often feel isolated from supports. This journey became known as “Break the Cycle”. It almost broke the riders!

The Break the Cycle team, now with four annual rides under their belt, brings in people, often with lived experience of suicide, to ride to different rural communities in NSW. In their exhausted state in grubby lycra they break down stigma, promote help seeking and encourage conversations about mental wellbeing and suicide prevention. Riders meet the community where they are at and authentically listen to their stories and share their own. This journey celebrates self reflection, shared experiences and healing.

The most recent ride in March 2023 saw the weary riders visit Murrumbidgee communities impacted by devastating floods, hot on the heels of recovering from the impacts of the COVID 19 pandemic. The team heard first hand the long-lasting effects these disasters had on livelihoods, relationships, cumulative losses in families and communities. For the riders, these emotional accounts came on the back of riding over 120kms that day. Riders were often confronted by their own life experiences, reflections on their own hardship and wellbeing struggles. These mutual connections are truly inspirational and life changing. It was an emotional ride.

We ride so that rural communities know that whilst we can’t always be present in their communities, we see them, and we hear them. And for the riders, these encounters are as profound and healing as they are for community.