About Us
Marston Wellbeing specializes in consulting and developing training solutions to address the issues arising in relation to understanding and communication between organisations and ethnic minority communities.
Trusted Advisors
Our Consulting Team
The Marston Wellbeing consulting team is experienced in the development of solutions to address these needs. Our consultants bring a wealth of experience – providing unique insights into this complex and sensitive issue.
We strive to be at the forefront of this field and continually develop our own in-house consulting methodology founded on years of experience and expertise.
Consultant Psychiatrist “There are particular challenges in helping patients from an ethnic minority background because of the cultural context. Unfortunately, this means treatment is often delayed and conditions deteriorate. The cost implications of this are significant.”
Our Senior Executive Team
(BSc, MSc, Psychology, doctoral student)
Suad Duale
Suad is a psychotherapist and is currently undertaking her doctoral studies. In addition to delivering therapy, Suad is an advocate for mental health, and women’s rights and wellbeing. She has been active within ethnic minority communities for many years and has worked as an advisory consultant with many public bodies and charities to assist them with regards mental health and communication and cultural issues faced by ethnic minority communities, including:
- The NHS
- West Midlands Police
- Healthwatch Birmingham
- Birmingham Mind
- The Grenfell Foundation
- Campaigning against Mental Health stigma and
- Campaigning against abuse
Suad is an active CPD qualified trainer in therapy, culture and identity. She founded the campaign, HADAL, which seeks to be a force for good in communities by providing safe spaces for self-development and to end the stigma around mental health issues. Suad is also highly skilled researcher.
Suad is passionate about giving a voice to the voiceless and shining a light on issues which are overlooked. She has previous experience as a consultant to professionals and organisations to guide them to improve services and engage with ethnic minority communities. Her consulting clients include national UK law firms; US law firms and US hospitals. With a primary focus on the development of strong communication between service users and health professionals, her previous research became a CPD accredited training course for therapists to help them better understand psychological needs unique to women from ethnic minority backgrounds.
Suad speaks four languages and has worked as an international interpreter for seven years in many different settings including legal and medical. Through her work as a psychotherapist and her consulting roles, she has witnessed first-hand the effect that communication barriers between cultural groups can have.
Suad met Michael Burrell four years ago whilst providing translation services to Michael in relation to a catastrophic birth injury case. She recognised that Michael was a professional who understood language and cultural barriers; he actively took time with his clients and understood the impact of different cultural backgrounds as well as how mistakes can impact the lives of others. Like Suad, Michael saw that a real difference could be made if we could bridge the cultural and communication gap that exists between service provider and ethnic minority communities. Through their shared understanding, Michael and Suad developed a great bond.
The idea of Marston Wellbeing was born from Suad’s desire to bridge the gap between public services and their ethnic minority service users. Suad could see the problems that existed as a result of cultural and communication barriers between patients and healthcare providers, and how these barriers can have catastrophic, even fatal, consequences. She believes in the improvement of services and building trust between ethnic minority communities and service providers.
QUOTE: “When we understand others, we can see them without barriers” Suad
BA (HONS) CIPR
Alison Burrell
Alison is a qualified CIPR Crisis Communications Consultant. She advises global organisations on building their crisis communications strategy – how to prepare, respond and recover from a crisis. Alison regularly provides workshops which focus specifically on crisis communications: guiding participants through crisis communications strategy and planning including auditing communications channels; preparing statements; stakeholder mapping and understanding key stakeholder groups such as the media, families, and company employees. This is an important step ahead of building the crisis communications component of a crisis management plan.
Alison was born and grew up in Chililabombwe, Zambia. She studied anthropology at Durham University before moving into a career in communication. Through her communication consulting engagements, Alison has travelled extensively to Asia, the Middle East, Africa and the Americas to work with clients from a wide range of sectors, including medical. This has given Alison extensive experience in relation to the cultural and communication barriers which exist between ethnic groups and, importantly, how these can be overcome.
Alison is passionate about working with clients to improve their organisational resilience through the delivery of international best practice crisis communications consulting. Her background in brand marketing and communications places her in the unique position of understanding the value of protecting an organisations brand and reputation. Alison believes that successful communication is essential to the to the effective provision of services. She brings the insight and intelligence needed to bridge the gap between your organisation and services users from a broad ethnic base.
NHS Senior Leadership Team
Rev. Martyn Jinks
Rev. Martyn Jinks FSBP MA(hc) FFC DipPM DipPsych/Coun
Martyn has worked within the NHS for many years and is the Head of Chaplaincy and Pastoral Care for Chesterfield NHS Foundation Trust. He is one of the country’s top NHS Senior Chaplains leading various teams of ordained and pastoral leaders across acute, mental health and palliative care services. He also advises on bereavement policy for local Government.
At Chesterfield NHS Foundation Trust, Martyn leads a truly multi-faith team – providing religious and spiritual care to service users, staff, visitors and volunteers. As part of the Trust’s Senior Leadership Team, Martyn is significantly involved across all sectors of the Trust. Through his work on the wards as well as his strategic leadership role, Martyn has a unique understanding of the role of culture and religion in the provision medical services.
Martyn began working with the NHS at Sandwell & West Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust more than 14 years ago. As an on-call and sessional chaplain, Martyn experienced first-hand the importance of communication and cultural understanding in the medical sector. Encouraged by his experiences at Sandwell, Martyn moved to the Royal Orthopaedic NHS Foundation Trust to manage a multi-faith team so that he could continue working in this field. At the Royal Orthopaedic, Martyn forged even greater relationships with ethnic minority religious and community leaders. Martyn continued to develop his understanding of the role of culture and communication in healthcare as he progressed through the NHS at a number of different Trusts, before arriving at Chesterfield as the Head of Chaplaincy and Pastoral Care.
In addition to being part of the senior leadership team, Martyn’s role also takes him to the wards where he provides pastoral and spiritual guidance to service users, their families and staff across all cultural backgrounds who are facing incredibly difficult times. This experience and connectivity gives Martyn a truly in-depth understanding of culture and communication within a medical context.
Consultant solicitor
Micheal Burrell
Michael is a consultant solicitor specialising in clinical negligence. He is also studying psychotherapy at Warwick University.
Michael left Shoosmiths LLP in January 2021, where he was a principal Associate in the clinical negligence team, in order to pursue a second career with Marston Wellbeing Limited.
After reading Law at Durham University, Michael qualified as a solicitor in 2004 – specialising in complex clinical negligence cases for clients who have suffered life changing injuries. Michael has spent more than a decade focusing on catastrophic injury cases, particularly amputations, birth injury and fatal cases.
Through his work as a solicitor, Michael has a deep understanding of NHS processes and protocols; analysing their efficacy and the extent to which they are being adequality engaged within the Trust or GP practice. Much of Michael’s work focused on governance, regulatory issues as well as the standard of care being provided.
Michael has been commended in the Legal 500, the foremost guide to law firms, being described as “tenacious and proactive”. The 2017 edition describes Michael as “well trained, knowledgeable and diligent”. He is a recognised as a specialist in medical negligence law and has been member of the Law Society Clinical Negligence Panel for many years. He frequently provides comment in the press on medical negligence issues.
Michael has worked with clients from ethnic minority communities for many years. He has seen, first-hand, the problems faced by healthcare providers with regards providing care to patients from ethnic minority backgrounds. It was whilst assisting ethnic minority clients that Michael began to see the impact that the breakdown in communication between patient and clinician can have. Michael has seen the cost of these communication issues – for patients and their families, the clinicians involved, and for the Trust and NHS as a whole. In many instances, Michael found that the failures in care were not caused by a lack of medical knowledge on the part of the clinician, rather as a result of a breakdown in communication, mistrust on behalf of the patient, a lack of engagement or a failure of understanding between patient and clinician.
Michael has worked with Suad Duale for more than four years. Suad has helped Michael understand clients from ethnic minority clients. They often work together with the client, medical experts and the Court in order to investigate claims and assess the extent of the injuries suffered. It is through their work together that Michael and Suad saw the need for training and consultancy to help bridge the gap between patients and healthcare providers.
Michael is married with two young daughters. He lives in Birmingham. He is a keen sportsman and has played rugby at county level. Before they had children, Michael and his wife spent a year in Whistler in Canada – skiing during the day and working as a pot washer at night. Michael’s favourite thing is the world is to go skiing with his wife and children.