{"id":605426,"date":"2026-09-04T08:06:08","date_gmt":"2026-09-04T08:06:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/605426\/"},"modified":"2026-09-04T08:06:08","modified_gmt":"2026-09-04T08:06:08","slug":"kent-mental-health-hub-in-dover-re-opens-after-extensive-refurb","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/605426\/","title":{"rendered":"Kent mental health hub in Dover re-opens after extensive refurb"},"content":{"rendered":"

A mental health hub based in a 1920s building in Kent has re-opened after a \u00a3680,000 refurbishment which saw it closed for half a year.<\/p>\n

Coleman House in Dover has been redecorated, with new windows and flooring fitted to improve conditions for patients and staff.<\/p>\n

Sharon Bean, a nurse prescriber at Coleman House, said the building was “dark, dingy, cold, damp and smelly” before.<\/p>\n

“Windows were rotting or wouldn’t open and now it’s light, friendly, welcoming and warm,” she said. “The more that we can encourage people to talk and open up, the better their recovery is likely to be. “<\/p>\n

“It all goes hand-in-hand – environment, patient care, treatment, intervention support equals recovery,” she added.<\/p>\n

Kent and Medway Mental Health NHS Trust said the investment was particularly important as people in the town experienced some of the greatest health inequalities in the county.<\/p>\n

Dover is ranked 78 out of 298 local authorities for deprivation, with 12% of neighbourhoods in the town “highly deprived”<\/a> according to the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government.<\/p>\n

The building, which has been operational since the early 1990s, is home to a range of services supporting people at different stages of their mental health journey, as well as perinatal mental health and mental health services for people with learning disabilities.<\/p>\n

Julie Kirby, interim chief nurse, said: “When patients come in, they want to come into somewhere that feels welcoming. <\/p>\n

“If you’re sitting in a room it’s very dark and you’re trying to have a one-to-one therapy session, for example, that impacts that session more significantly.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A mental health hub based in a 1920s building in Kent has re-opened after a \u00a3680,000 refurbishment which…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":605427,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[163,85,46,522,523],"class_list":["post-605426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mental-health","tag-health","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-mental-health","tag-mentalhealth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/605426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=605426"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/605426\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/605427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=605426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=605426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=605426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}