Changing the way we face disfigurement
Changing Faces is the UK’s leading charity tackling the psychological and social challenge of living with a
disfigurement. There are an estimated 1.3m people in the UK and many millions worldwide who have facial and other disfigurements, whether from birth, accidents, warfare, violence, burns, cancer surgery, skin or eye conditions, facial paralysis or any other cause. We know that with the right support and an informed and inclusive culture, people with disfigurements can, and do, lead full, happy and purposeful lives.
So, we aim to support and represent the interests of children, young people and adults with disfigurements, and their families, through three inter-related programmes:
- Caring: Building the self-esteem and self-confidence of people who have disfigurements, and their families, so that they can tackle the difficulties they face
- Catalyst: Working with professionals and policy-makers in health care, education and workplaces so that ‘the system’ prevents discrimination and addresses people’s psychological and social needs
- Campaigning: Raising public awareness about disfigurement through informed media coverage and, through our Face Equality campaign, promoting equality and fair treatment.
Our ultimate aim is to enable everyone who has a disfigurement to lead full and active lives, free of prejudice and discrimination.
VTCT supports the quest for face equality
The Vocational Training Charitable Trust’s incredibly generous 5-year grant made in August 2008 simply transformed Changing Faces’ capacity to instil confidence amongst professionals and policy-makers in health care, education and workplaces. The grant has enabled us to grow a team of Training and Policy Advisers in each discipline and to expand our team of regional Officers throughout the UK.
What is our rationale?
Medical treatment and surgery can help to make a disfigurement less noticeable but can rarely remove it completely. Patients and families need to have access locally to the specialist support they need to build self-esteem and confidence. As pupils, employees and customers, they need access to disfigurement-confident support and service to meet the everyday social challenges posed by disfigurement.
What have we done with the grant?
Our Policy and Practice team has made much progress:
In Health, we have published new advisory guides for plastic surgeons and skin, eye and cancer specialists, embarked on a new e-learning initiative for GPs and run dozens of training events for individual psychologists, counsellors and nurses, and also for many professional bodies.
In schools, we have run many training sessions for teachers, influenced the training of teachers and have taken part in many influential educational debates. Our much-admired children’s ‘Face Equality’ posters which appeared in the London Underground and on many sites around the country, have been adapted for school staff and distributed at the annual National Union of Teachers’ conference.
With employers, our Face Equality at Work scheme now has 30 members including many household names: Barclays, BT, British Airways, Tesco, Shell, Marks & Spencer, Remploy… all of whom have committed to embedding face equality and ensuring excellent recruitment and customer services for people with disfigurements.
In wider representation, we have raised awareness of Westminster’s and Cardiff’s politicians and policy-makers, and have worked long and hard to influence the provision for people with disfigurements in the Equality Act, passed just before the election in May 2010.
Our UK Network team of Officers in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland and in 4 English regions are increasingly effective eyes and ears and voices for people with disfigurements in their areas.