Simon Bratt is a researcher and practitioner based at Liverpool Hope University, with more than a decade of frontline NHS and third-sector experience in prisons, psychiatric inpatient settings, hostels, A&E, and community substance use services.
His book A Philosophical Critique of Co-Existing Mental Health and Substance Use Challenges: Pain Comes First — Drugs Come Later (Palgrave Macmillan, 2026) argues that the failure of dual-diagnosis services is structural, not accidental, and offers the Layered Care Model as a practice-ready alternative.
He works with NHS Trusts, local authorities and voluntary-sector partners on translating the model into commissioning specifications, training programmes and service redesign — and speaks regularly to clinicians, commissioners and academic audiences across the UK and Europe.
One page. Three approved bios (long, short, one-line), the official book description, ISBN/DOI, cover image link, and contact details — everything a journalist, podcast producer or conference programmer needs in a single PDF.
Download media kit (PDF) Or send a direct enquiry →Tailored to your audience — whether commissioners, clinicians, academics, peer workers, or mixed teams. Each can be delivered as a keynote, workshop or in-house staff day.
Why “dual diagnosis” is not two problems but one mis-named structural failure. The inherited assumptions that make services incapable of holding co-existing distress — and what a coherent alternative looks like.
The four pillars — Structural Flexibility, Integrated Social Determinants, Enhanced Agency, Contextualised Care — translated into commissioning language and service-redesign moves you can take in your next round.
How the everyday machinery of assessment, diagnosis and triage silences the people most affected — and the practical changes that restore credibility without flattening complexity.
Why most “co-production” fails, what a phenomenologically serious alternative looks like, and what changes when peer voice is treated as evidence rather than decoration.
Tailored to your team's setting and the specific stuck points your service is grappling with — drawn from the book's framework but built around the live problems on your desk. Especially useful for multi-agency partnerships and commissioning collectives that need a shared vocabulary before they redesign.
Pick the shape that fits the room.
Conference plenaries, invited lectures, professional society events. Argument-driven, with time for Q&A.
Small-group, interactive, applied. For teams that need to translate ideas into the specifics of their own service.
Bespoke to your team and setting. Mix of teaching, structured discussion and live work on the problems you bring.
Facilitated discussion with senior leads. Useful before re-commissioning rounds, or to align partners around shared specification language.