Over the last year, Mental Health Concern has been working in partnership with Tees Esk Wear Valley and Northumberland Tyne and Wear NHS Foundation Trusts to commission a Positive Psychology programme, co-produced with people with lived experience of mental health problems.
The scope of the project was to develop a course, informed by both the evidence base of positive psychology and the lived experience of those who have experienced mental health problems. The course has been developed by Get Mindfuel and includes exploration of personal strengths, positive emotions and relationships and the theory of wellbeing.
The programme has helped people to achieve significant improvements in reported wellbeing, as the course Learners have the opportunity to develop their knowledge and practise using the skills and tools that positive psychology has to offer. The impact of the 10-week programme was measured using WEMWBS and other methods.
The partnership is now planning to release the course materials on a creative commons licence for other organisations to freely use. The partnership is really keen to share the learning and resource materials and ask in return that anyone running a course shares their learning and outcomes data, so that the emerging evidence base for these kinds of interventions can be grown.
Further details of the Positive Psychology programme can be found via Northern England Clinical Network:
http://www.necn.nhs.uk/networks/mental-health-dementia-and-neurological-conditions-network/positive-psychology-course-materials/