Mental health: ethnic minority experiences

Overview

In this section you can find out about ethnic minority (BME) experiences of mental health by seeing and hearing people share their personal stories on film. Our researchers travelled all around the UK to talk to 30 people in their own homes. Find out what people said about issues such as diagnosis, therapy and support from family and friends. We hope you find the information helpful and reassuring.

Interviews in other languages: Bengali (Reena); Cantonese (Sarah, H.Y. Leung); Punjabi (Raj).

You may also be interested in our section on mental health: ethnic minority carers’ experiences, and our section on Young people’s experiences of depression and low mood.

BME mental health site preview

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David: My experience of mental illness. Well, I think that really started when I was about five years old.

Edward: So it's a kind of, it's a sad feeling, an intensely sad feeling with regret put in there somewhere, and with a powerlessness put in that as well, and disempowerment to change anything for the better.

Hanif: And I think over the years I've managed to learn to cope. You know, I've kind of, you know, and realized, you know, there are times where I become manic, but I think now it's kind of I have learned myself to manage my kind of highs and I try and do it without medication.

Jay: That is my constant message to mental health professionals, ‘don't see diagnosis, see people.’

This section is from research by the University of Oxford.

Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences logo

Supported by:
CSIP (Care Services Improvement Partnership)
Hulme University Fund, Oxford

Publication date: June 2008
Last updated: September 2018.