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Movers & Shakers (M&S) is a project initiative relating to healthy ageing for older adults in Buckinghamshire. This early intervention well‐being programme aims to engage the mind, body and soul of participants by encouraging participation in physical, mental and creative activities and healthy eating initiatives. The Movers & Shakers programme can be adapted to create an individual ‘style’ to suit the specific needs of different communities. This article details how the Movers & Shakers programme has been adapted for use with Asian and Caribbean communities, combining the elements of the programme to create an environment of social inclusion for older people.

This article identifies some of the key issues that need to be considered when trying to promote positive mental health and well‐being for older people from black and minority ethnic (BME) communities. The authors say that while developing a cultural understanding is important for providing good care for BME elders, it is also important to recognise that a number of structural or organisational issues that go beyond language or culture can affect health and access to health. The article also promotes the significant role of voluntary sector organisations in developing culturally appropriate mental health promotion services for BME elders.

There is a shortage of examples of arrangements and practice approaches that focus on mental wellbeing in black and minority ethnic (BME) older people. This article draws on our practice enquiry1, which brought together accounts of social care practice across different types of social care settings from four parts of the UK, away from the areas of high demographic concentration that have been the focus of most previous research. Over 80 practitioners, managers, older people and carers were interviewed over 2009‐2010. They described and reflected on the support for older people from BME backgrounds, particularly focusing on how they might promote mental well‐being.

Despite contemporary concerns arising from high levels of serious mental illness in this group, there is no convincing evidence that the mental well‐being of black men is generally poor. The potential for general practice to influence mental well‐being derives from the totality of its services to patients. Black and minority ethnic (BME) users report lower levels of satisfaction with general practice services than the population as a whole. A review of evidence indicates poorer access to effective care in general practice by BME users. For general practice to become a service that is culturally competent for multicultural communities the setting of consultations and skills‐employed need to maximise patient enablement, and patient profile data, including self‐ascribed ethnicity, needs to be developed and utilised for routine race equality audit.

Increasingly, the potential of a social marketing approach to tackle complex and challenging health priorities is being realised for black and minority ethnic (BME) groups. Social marketing is the application of marketing concepts and techniques to achieve behavioural goals for social good. For BME groups, which often have worse health outcomes than the general population, social marketing can be an effective method to support targeted interventions for improved health and well‐being and reduced health inequalities. This paper describes some examples of social marketing approaches aimed at improving the health and well‐being of BME communities. The examples show positive outcomes overall and provide some key learning points for future work in this area.

Perinatal mental health is a major concern among women of childbearing age. Women from a black and minority ethnic background are widely believed to have particular needs that are often not given the attention they deserve. NHS Croydon launched a perinatal mental health project to develop a closer and better partnership between the Primary Care Trust (PCT), Croydon Council and black and minority ethnic (BME) voluntary organisations through an action learning approach. Experience was shared to improve engagement and use of health services by mothers from BME communities in Croydon who had encountered mental health problems during pregnancy or following childbirth. By exploring and identifying such issues and problems, the action learning set endeavoured to find solutions for a joined‐up approach to achieve identifiable benefits. Some problems were encountered, such as a lack of communication between health professionals and BME community groups. The learning outcomes were to raise awareness and to recognise the cultural differences with mothers of BME background experiencing perinatal mental health problems. The learning from the project will be disseminated to a wider audience to promote best practice.

This study aims to find out the differences in the employee well-being of teleworkers in Hungary prior to and during the pandemic restrictions and explores whether the differences stem from (1) the presence of children or (2) the changes in the telework situation (freely chosen or forced by pandemic restrictions).

As the first step of this study of office workers, the authors created a “one working day” measure within the conceptual framework of positive psychology that is suitable for comparing the well-being factors experienced in various work environments. The survey was completed by two independent samples: 52 office workers regarding home office before the appearance of the virus in Europe (Phase 1) and 152 office workers during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in Hungary (Phase 2).

This research reveals that teleworking during the pandemic has increased irritability and tension for all teleworkers, but the stress levels, the overall subjective well-being and the level of engagement were significantly affected only in the case of those teleworkers who raise small children. Despite the overlapping responsibilities of parents, their work-related sense of accomplishment did not change during the COVID-19 lockdown. The forced home office setup may, however, entail the strengthening of co-worker relationships in the online space.

By understanding the relationship between well-being predictors and the changes in the situation of remote working, the results may help develop intervention programs to promote employee well-being in challenging times.

The purpose of this article is to review the series of five articles which have appeared in the Journal since the June 2007 edition. The authors of the articles in the series were tasked with exploring the theme of holistic care and integrated practice with BME individuals and communities who access health and social care services. This article explores how far this issue has been addressed, and offers some ways forward in thinking about integrated care for BME individuals and communities.

Despite the growing evidence base about depression and anxiety and its application to service settings and practice, we are short of practice examples about what works and for whom. This applies to older people in general but particularly to groups, such as people from black and minority ethnic backgrounds. This article discusses policy and legislative encouragements to think about equality of access and diversity issues in mental health services and wider mental health promotion activities. It analyses recent research and policy documents in the context of demographic change and practice. It argues that the context of personalisation in England may provide new opportunities to consider what older people will find most acceptable and effective in meeting their needs, but notes the challenges that this will bring to community‐based organisations and specialist services.

The promotion of public mental health is a challenging endeavour for policy actors and stakeholders. In particular, the implementation of public mental health initiatives highlighted in Standard One of the National Service Framework for Mental Health has been poor and patchy (Department of Health, 2004a). This paper attempts to illuminate the complex process of public mental health policy implementation at local level through the exploration of stakeholders' actions.An exploratory case study design was selected, focusing on one local health and social care community within inner London. A conceptual framework about policy implementation and the concept of partnership working are used to shape the analysis of the empirical findings.This paper addresses the challenges associated with the promotion of public mental health initiatives within one local NHS health and social care community. It attempts to increase the understanding and insights into public mental health policy and practice at local level from a policy implementation standpoint. Using an empirical case study of public mental health in an English locality, some of the key issues explored in this paper are about perceptions of public mental health concepts among key policy actors and also stakeholders' behaviour in Local Implementation team (LIT) partnerships. Furthermore, the authors address the issue of how local policy actors engage the local community in supporting the needs of vulnerable groups such as service users and black and minority ethnic (BME) groups.Although functional partnership are essential for the promotion of public mental health initiatives, the interdependencies of the stakeholders, competition for resources, power dynamics and the difficulty of engaging a diverse range of voices have a significant limiting effect on achieving successful policy implementation on the ground.