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This paper aims to explain how the CAPITAL Project Trust established an inpatient peer support project in West Sussex.

The paper sets the project within local and historical contexts, seeking to explain some of the reasons for the growing interest in formal peer support, before explaining the methodology used to set up the project and the learning along the way. The author draws on evidence from evaluations to demonstrate the added value offered by inpatient peer support and argues for a peer defined set of values to underpin all peer support projects.

Models of inpatient peer support need to be flexible to both the individual talents of peer support workers and the cultures of the different wards in which they work.

The paper shows that the project demonstrates the value that can be added by independent peer support workers being placed on acute inpatient wards and the importance for service users of peer support being peer led.