Pro-Active Minds Green Gym launch
| Published date | 19 June 2017 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JPMH-03-2017-0007 |
| Pages | 88-90 |
| Date | 19 June 2017 |
| Author | Craig Lister,Stuart Reid,Madeleine Musgrove,Chris Speirs |
| Subject Matter | Health & social care,Mental health,Public mental health |
Craig Lister, Stuart Reid, Madeleine Musgrove and Chris Speirs
Pro-Active Minds Green Gym launch
The project
The Conservation Volunteers (TCV) in partnership with Mind, have received funding from the
Department of Health’s Health and Social Care Volunteering Fund to deliver a practice
development project. The aim of the initiative is to promote individual resilience and wellbeing for
people who are at risk of developing a mental health condition or who have otherwise presented
with emotional distress.
The project, Pro-Active Minds, has been co-designed with NHS and Public Health
Commissioners and will contribute to the achievement of local Health and Wellbeing
strategies in the delivery areas, providing an effective prevention and early intervention
programme. It aims to enhance local capacity; with the potential to reduce costs for healthcare
services, and provide a mechanism to establish greater community cohesion.
The project utilises an innovative and sustainable volunteer-led, peer support model within an
ecotherapy setting based on a framework of “Five Ways to Wellbeing”(Aked et al., 2009).
Pro-Active Minds launched in February 2016 in the London Boroughs of Enfield, Hackney,
Hounslow and Newham, a partnership with TCV, Mind, Local Minds, Public Health and Adult
Social Care Services.
TCV
Every day TCV works across the UK to create healthier and happier communities for everyone.
Delivering over 900,000 volunteering hours a year to support communities, TCV’s activities have
a lasting impact on people’s health, prospects and outdoor places.
Mind
Mind, the mental health charity, provides advice and support to empower anyone experiencing a
mental health problem. Mind campaign to improve services, raise awareness and promote
understanding.
Pro-Active Minds: building on evidenced-based Green Gym® model
Pro-Active Minds builds on TCV’s evidence-based Green Gym® model (TSIP, RSPH), which
supports groups to be physically active and socially engaged by transforming neglected green
spaces through practical activities (Plate 1).
Green Gym is a “health by stealth”programme. It is marketed to volunteers and prioritises
individual outcomes (i.e. health, wellbeing and resilience) with an additional focus on potentially
wider social benefits and collective group outcomes (i.e. environmental, access to nature and
sense of community). This positioning of the Green Gym uniquely enables TCV to engage and
support both those referred and people who are not already accessing local services, at risk and
often isolated.
The Green Gym model used by Pro-Active Minds supports the “Five Ways to Wellbeing”
“Connect, Be Active, Take Notice, Keep Learning and Give”are a set of evidence-based actions
which promote wellbeing and that can be undertaken by individuals in their daily lives. This gives
the model lasting impact (Figure 1).
Craig Lister is the Managing
Director at the Green Gym, The
Conservation Volunteers,
Doncaster, UK.
Stuart Reid is a Community
Programmes Manager at the
Networks and Communities,
Mind, London, UK.
Madeleine Musgrove is based
at the Mind, London, UK.
Chris Speirs is a Health
Development Manager at the
Green Gym, The Conservation
Volunteers, Doncaster, UK.
PAG E 88
j
JOURNAL OF PUBLIC MENTAL HEALTH
j
VOL. 16 NO. 2 2017, pp. 88-90, © Emerald Publishing Limited, ISSN 1746-5729 DOI 10.1108/JPMH-03-2017-0007
Public health case study
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