Mental health

Mental health conditions can have a significant impact on all areas of someone's life, and their prevalence is increasing worldwide. In Kent, suicide is the main cause of death in those aged 10 to 35. It accounts for nearly a quarter of all deaths among 20 to 24-year-olds.

Depression is one of the leading causes of disability in England and adults with mental health problems are one of the most socially excluded groups in society.

See also our pages on dementia, alcohol, sexual health and minority groups.

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Our resources

Our resources

Data and reports

Additional information can be found in our Health and Social Care Maps self-serve tool. We are constantly developing this resource in response to your feedback.

We have produced a 2019 Mental Health Needs Assessment for Kent (PDF, 5.0 MB) and some additional analyses (PDF, 2.5 MB) to support the 2019 Mental Health Needs Assessment. There are some inaccuracies in section 2.2 which estimates the prevalence of common mental illnesses which have now been corrected in this supplementary report.

We have also produced the following needs assessments:

We have produced a Kent mental health & wellbeing index, which provides an assessment of the relative assets and vulnerabilities of each ward in Kent in respect of the mental health and wellbeing of the population within it.

The Kent and Medway Suicide Prevention team are responsible for delivering the local Suicide Prevention Strategy 2021 - 2025, which seeks to prevent suicides amongst our residents. The programme operates broadly in two ways, commissioning projects and system leadership / quality improvement.

The suicide prevention team have developed a resources Padlet which consists of campaign materials, training links, funded projects, research, reports and more. It is aimed at professionals to gain a better understanding of support that is available locally and to upskill in suicide prevention activity.

We welcome the opportunity to promote our teams work in relevant forums. If partners would like to find out more, or have a presentation from the team, please email suicideprevention@kent.gov.uk

External resources

External resources

A number of organisations produce mental health statistics both at national and local level.