Publish date: 4 June 2025

A local mental health safety champion was invited to the King’s Garden Party in recognition of her exceptional dedication and lasting contributions to the local community.

Natasha Bryant is suicide prevention lead at Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust (AWP) and joined others at the event at Buckingham Palace who ‘have made a positive contribution to their communities’.

Among a series of projects, Natasha spearheaded the Trust’s Safety Assessment work, focusing on a person’s needs and how to support their long-term psychological and physical safety, as well as the safety of those around them and the wider public.

Natasha said: “It was an incredible honour to be nominated by AWP and to attend a Royal Garden Party at Buckingham Palace. Having worked with AWP for many years, I’ve always simply aimed to listen with compassion and respond to the needs of those we serve.

“My AWP journey has provided me with invaluable opportunities to grow and develop in my nursing career, for which I am deeply grateful. I feel privileged to be part of a Trust that truly values the voices of lived experience and the insights of frontline clinicians.

Attending the garden party was a humbling experience and a moment of quiet reflection, on lives lost to suicide, and on all those impacted by suicide and suicidality.”

AWP provides healthcare for people with serious mental illness, learning disabilities and autism in inpatient and community-based settings, supporting a population of around 1.8 million across Bath and North East Somerset (BaNES), Swindon and Wiltshire, and Bristol, North Somerset, and South Gloucestershire.