Consumers as partners in writing projects : lessons learnt from mental health

In Australia, there have been national directivesto involve consumers in all aspects of delivering a mental health service since the early 1990s as part of a National Mental Health Strategy. Consumer consultants, peer support workers and service-user representatives now play an integral role in the planning, delivery and evaluation of mental health services (Cleary, Horsfall, Hunt, Escott & Happell 2011). The role of the consumer consultant or peer support worker can be summed up by the adage: Nothing about us without us. Consumer involvement adds a unique and an important dimension to the mental health discourses. As people who have 'walked the walk' of experiencing mental health issues, and then engaged with services in their journey to recovery, their insights remind us of the crutial need to truly hear and authentically engage with consumers and look for the consumer's strengths and potential. Furthermore, our written discourses and the language used reflect and strongly influence our discipline and the practices with it. By authentically engaging with and including consumers as co-authors in our work, we are helping to position the concerns, views, and needs of patients and service users as central to our concerns and to ensure that the service-user perspective remains at the heart of our discourses.