Search results

UK best practice guidelines for the treatment for people with schizophrenia recommend the use of psychoeducational approaches. The purpose of this paper is to describe the introduction of psychoeducational groups for people with an intellectual disability and co-morbid mental illness within forensic settings.

“Staying Well”, a psychoeducational programme for people with an intellectual disability and co-morbid mental illness was based in part on a group programme from Ashworth Hospital, but adapted and developed to be suitable for people with intellectual disability. Input from a very experienced speech and language therapist was of great importance. Five groups with a total of 20 participants (15 different individuals) with mild to moderate intellectual disability and co-morbid mental illness were run over a two-year period. At the end of each group, an individualised “Staying Well Plan” was devised, to reduce the risk of future relapses.

The group was very positively welcomed in the two pilot hospitals, by participants and members of the clinical teams. The key measure of the success of the programme is that the “Staying Well Plans” developed for the individuals are still in place two years after the completion of the first groups.

The authors believe that this approach is of benefit to both the participants and their carers, stimulating positive engagement, open discussion about mental illness and reinforcing strategies for “Staying Well”.

This paper shows how a psychoeducational approach to severe mental illness in individuals with an intellectual disability is both possible and well received.

The purpose of this paper is to describe a feasibility study into the development and pilot of a psychoeducational group for people with intellectual disability and co-morbid mental disorder (including mental illness and personality disorder) within forensic settings.

“Mind Matters”, a psychoeducational programme for people with an intellectual disability and co-morbid mental disorders is a group based programme in a medium secure hospital, adapted and developed to be suitable for people with intellectual disability therapist multidisciplinary approach was key to its development. An open group on a 16-bedded ward for individuals with mild to moderate intellectual disability and co-morbid mental illness was delivered over a six-week period.

The group was positively received in pilot by participants and members of the clinical teams. Attendance and engagement of participants were key measures of the success of the programme. In addition to the apparent increased social skills and motivation to engage with future psychological intervention.

The authors believe that this approach benefitted both the group members and staff on ward, reinforcing strategies for maintaining positive mental health. It also stimulated engagement, discussion about mental disorders including mental illness, personality disorder and intellectual disabilities.

This paper shows how a psychoeducational approach to mental disorder and mental health in individuals with an intellectual disability is possible, beneficial and well received.

Carers of people with mental health problems present with high levels of burden, poor mental well-being and feelings of disempowerment by mental health services. The purpose of this paper is to establish whether providing a psychoeducation skill programme for carers would lead to an improvement of mental well-being, reduce the levels of burden that carers sometimes feel while caring for someone with mental illness and also to increase empowerment. This paper provides a service evaluation study of an innovative carer-led psychoeducational intervention that was undertaken.

This programme was initiated and led by a carer who had experienced a lack of service provision to support carers and families in understanding and caring for a relative with severe and enduring mental health diagnoses. A model of co-production was adopted with the carer who led this initiative working closely with an occupational therapist and consultant psychologist in its development and delivery. Data were collected to measure the impact of the training at five different time points. The measures employed to measure outcomes were the Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Well-being Scale, the Burden Assessment Scale and Family Empowerment Scale.

Results indicated improved well-being, reduced burden and increased family empowerment in carers who completed this peer-led carer initiative psychoeducational programme.

This service evaluation study was conducted in a single site and in the site in which it was developed. The carer consultant who led this evaluation and development of the intervention was also the peer worker who delivered the interventions. Hence, the authors are unable to ascertain if the results reported are unique to the individual peer worker. The transferability of this programme and generalisability of the result should therefore be treated with caution and further replication of this model and research is required. This would be beneficial to be conducted in an alternative site from where it was developed, delivered by different facilitators and include a control group.

The evidence from this study indicates that carers are able and willing to attend a group psychoeducational programme. A high number of referrals to the programme in a relatively short timeframe indicates that there is significant demand for such a service. The implementation of the programme is relatively straightforward. The key challenges for practical implementation are to have the right carer to lead and deliver the programme and the right support system in place for them (financial and supervision). Co-production also is not without challenges, the peer worker and occupational staff need to ensure that mutually valued and respected working relationship should develop.

This is the first evaluation of the impact of a carer-led psychoeducation intervention for carers of people with mental health difficulties in secondary mental health services.

Many health-care professionals leave clinical practice temporarily or permanently. Interventions designed to facilitate the return of health-care professionals fail to consider returners’ psychosocial needs despite their importance for patient care. This study aims to evaluate the efficacy of a psychoeducational intervention in improving personal skills and well-being among UK-based health-care professionals returning to clinical practice.

In total, 20 health-care professionals took part in the one-day intervention and completed measures of demographics, self-efficacy, positive attitudes towards work and perceived job resources before and after the intervention. A baseline comparison group of 18 health-care professionals was also recruited.

Significant associations were detected between return-to-work stage and study group. Following the intervention, participants reported improvements in self-efficacy and, generally, perceived more job resources, whereas positive attitudes towards work decreased. While none of these changes were significant, the intervention was deemed acceptable by participants. This study provides modest but promising evidence for the role of psychoeducation as a tool in supporting the psychosocial needs of returning health-care professionals.

Additional research is needed to clarify the reliability of intervention effects, its effectiveness compared to alternative interventions, and the impact across different subgroups of returning health-care professionals.

Return-to-practice interventions should address the psychosocial needs of health-care professionals in terms of their personal skills and well-being. Psychoeducation can increase self-efficacy and perceptions of job resources among returning health-care professionals.

This study sheds light on a relatively understudied, but fundamental area – the psychosocial challenges of health-care professionals returning to clinical practice – and further justifies the need for tailored interventions.

Negative attitudes towards “personality disorder” are common among mental health professionals. This study aims to design a psychoeducational training targeting attitudes to “personality disorder” for staff working in a London psychiatric hospital. Its impact on staff attitudes was evaluated.

Mental health clinicians were recruited from five acute psychiatric wards. Feasibility of implementing the training was measured. A free-association exercise explored baseline attitudes to “personality disorder” and visual analogue scales assessed staff attitudes pre- and post-training. Content analysis of staff feedback was carried out.

Psychoeducational training was found to be feasible, well-attended and highly valued by ward staff (N = 47). Baseline results revealed negative perceptions of “personality disorder”. Post-training, significant improvements in understanding, levels of compassion and attitudes to working with service users with a diagnosis of a “personality disorder” were observed. Staff feedback highlighted desire for further training and support.

The sample size was relatively small and there was no control group, so findings should be interpreted with caution.

The findings highlight the need for support for staff working with service users with diagnoses of “personality disorder” on acute psychiatric wards. Providing regular training with interactive components may promote training as a resource for staff well-being. Planning to ensure service users’ and carers’ views are incorporated into the design of future training will be important.

This study is innovative in that it investigates the impact of a brief psychoeducational training on “personality disorder” designed for mental health staff on acute psychiatric wards.

Literature regarding recovery has focussed on diagnoses such as schizophrenia, with few papers focussing on borderline personality disorder (BPD). This is a significant area in need of change because a lack of research concentrating on recovery from BPD could be seen to perpetuate the view that recovery from this condition may not be possible. Recovery Colleges (RCs) in the UK began in 2009and aim to offer co-produced and co-facilitated psychoeducational courses to encourage recovery and enable people to develop skills and knowledge so they become experts in the self-management of their difficulties. Given the gaps within the recovery literature, it is unclear how Recovery Colleges can support recovery for people diagnosed with BPD. The purpose of this study was to explore the impact of a Recovery College course for people diagnosed with BPD.

Using participatory methods, this paper aims to explore the question of what personal recovery looks like for people with BPD and how this may prove useful in developing future practice in RCs. Qualitative feedback data was collected from 51 managing intense emotions courses delivered to 309 students using a patient reported experience measure between Autumn 2015 and Autumn 2021.

The results of this study indicate that people with BPD can experience recovery, whilst still experiencing symptoms, as long as they receive appropriate co-produced, recovery-orientated support and services.

Further research in this area could help shape future clinical practice by embedding a recovery-focussed programme into community services.

Literature regarding recovery has focussed on diagnoses such as schizophrenia withfew papers focussing on BPD. This is an area in need of change because a lack of research on recovery from BPD could be seen to perpetuate the view that recovery from this condition may not be possible. RCs offer co-produced and co-facilitated psychoeducational courses around recovery, enabling people to develop skills and knowledge to become experts in the self-management of their difficulties. Given the gaps within the recovery literature it is unclear how RCs can support recovery for this group of service users.

The purpose of this paper is to describe the development of a psychoeducational support group for informal carers of people with Huntington's disease (HD).

A clinical intervention was designed by a specialist HD service in consultation with HD carers, building on resources from a generic programme for carers, to meet the specific needs of HD families. A mixed methods, repeated measures design was used to examine any potential benefits this had on carer confidence and quality of life, and to ascertain the most beneficial aspects of the programme.

At the end of the group, participants reported feeling more confident in caring for relatives with HD. Carers reported that gaining new information and being with other carers was helpful.

Although participant numbers were small, this pilot indicates that informal carers of HD patients appear to value psychoeducational support delivered in a group format. Evaluation of this type of intervention for carers warrants more rigorous investigation.

There is a paucity of research that evaluates the impact of HD-specific carer interventions. This offers a description of a unique intervention that was aimed to increase knowledge and confidence among HD carers and to help provide the basis for more comprehensive services to be offered to carers of this devastating genetic illness.

The purpose of this paper is to establish and evaluate a psychotropic medication education group for men with intellectual disability on a secure psychiatric ward.

A multi-disciplinary team was convened to oversee the project. A curriculum was developed that covered major classes of psychotropic drugs as well as broader themes related to taking medication and general wellbeing. Each group session incorporated a range of teaching methods supported by accessible materials. Evaluation was by qualitative and quantitative methods.

There was interest and enthusiasm for the group. Participant feedback was generally positive and most of those who completed the group reported achieving their personal learning goals. There was no significant difference in results of a medication knowledge test at baseline and at the end of the course. Feedback from group members and reflections of the course facilitators are discussed.

The results of this small-scale study may not be applicable to other groups or settings. Evaluation measures seemed unable to capture some elements of the group processes and outcomes.

Establishing and running a psychoeducational group on a low-secure ward for men with intellectual disabilities is possible and potentially valuable. Learning from this project will be useful for others considering group-based interventions for people with intellectual disability.

This paper adds to the limited literature describing interventions to improve medication knowledge in people with intellectual disability.

Internationally, among mental health difficulties, psychosis appears most stigmatised. Yet, research on mental health education specific to psychosis, including stigma reduction strategies, is limited. This study aims to evaluate the efficacy of a brief empirically informed indirect contact-based intervention (CBI) on reducing stigma associated with psychosis in the context of a Southeast Asian society.

In total, 168 young adults were randomised into three groups, two intervention conditions and one active control. Stigmatisation levels were measured at pre-intervention, post-intervention and at a 30-day follow-up. Group differences in attitudes were analysed using a 3 × 3 two-way mixed-subjects ANOVA.

Results revealed that there were no significant differences in declared stigma between the three conditions. However, a significant effect of time on the improvement of attitudes was observed at post-intervention. This effect was not sustained at follow-up.

Individual psychoeducational CBIs implemented in the context of collectivistic societies do not produce sustainable effects in the reduction of stigma. Although a transient desirable improvement in the attitudes occurs among individuals, this is subsequently counteracted by the influence of stigma existing on a systemic level. Therefore, public mental health education in collectivistic cultures should address societal mechanisms maintaining unhelpful perceptions of those with psychosis.

The study examined the effect of brief CBIs on the reduction of stigma associated with psychosis in a collectivistic society and demonstrated systemic limitations of individually delivered psychoeducational interventions.

The relationship between learning and mental health, as well as a growing body of literature, underscores the need for art therapy in educational settings. This is particularly true for learners with special needs. Shostak et al. (1985) affirmed that “for children with special needs, art therapy in a school setting can offer opportunities to work through obstacles that impede educational success” (p. 19). School art therapy facilitates improved social interaction, increased learning behaviors, appropriate affective development, and increased empathy and personal well-being. It can be adapted to meet the specific developmental needs of individual students and to parallel students’ developmental, learning, and behavioral objectives. This chapter introduces the reader to the history and basic constructs of art therapy as a psychoeducational therapeutic intervention in schools. Model programs are identified, as well as the role of the art therapist within the context of K-12 education settings. Additionally, examples of special populations who benefit from art therapy intervention within school systems are provided, along with considerations for school-wide art therapy.