‘Pioneering’ Trust part of UK international trade missions

An education and training expert from the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust will attend an international trade mission to Thailand and Vietnam in September, as part of the UK’s efforts to promote its healthcare and services internationally.

The Trust was one of a handful invited as part of the UK delegation, led by the Department for Business and Trade.

The Tavistock and Portman is a unique Trust, whose services centre on a symbiotic relationship between its two halves – its pioneering training, and education department, and its clinical services which provide treatment to people who need help. The Trust has been at the forefront of exploring mental health and wellbeing since the First World War.

“Broadly speaking, half of our work is clinical and the other is education and training. We provide consultations to organisations and design tailored courses to meet the training demands of workforces. From our inception we’ve recognised the importance of cross-cultural exchange in developing mental health theory, practice and education. So we’re always interested in potential areas for collaboration,” says Dr Paul Dugmore, Director of Education at the Trust, whose remit includes raising the organisation’s profile internationally.

Paul has plenty to work with.

With over a century of original and innovative thought on human development, the Trust uses a unique approach that provides education, training and research from a variety of theoretical perspectives – systemic, psychoanalytic and developmental.

It offers hundreds of courses, many of them well reputed and considered the gold standard in various sectors. These include introductory, applied, pre-clinical and clinical courses, university-accredited post-qualification and doctoral programmes, CPD and other short courses across health, social care and allied sectors.

As an international training institution, every year the Tavistock and Portman attracts more than 3,000 students.

“We also deliver other short courses in organisations when they commission training from us, so we train thousands of students per year. Some come from overseas, and we have Home Office (HO) student visa status so our students can apply for visas from the HO and we can support them to study here. We are well known in many countries and we do small pieces of work with international partners but we want to grow our education and training across the world,” says Paul.

This will be the Trust’s second trade mission for the year.

Earlier in the year, it was one of several British health organisations that took part in the UK’s four-day Healthcare Trade Mission to Hospitalar, Brazil. The trip was aimed at building relationships and exchanging best practices with hospitals and health organisations in Brazil, while also mapping the country’s needs and fostering business opportunities between both.

Other organisations that took part included The Christie NHS Foundation Trust, Chelsea and Westminster NHs FT, Health Care First, Paxman and the Royal College of General Practitioners.

“As a pioneering healthcare organisation we have a lot to offer the world. These trips offer us an opportunity to better understand the requirements, needs and context within different countries. We get to develop contacts with potential partners, with a view to being able to promote and sell our services, products and training,” says Paul.